Whether to advance to the Heavenly Aberration Realm required the consumption of twenty thousand years of lifespan.
The Heavenly Dao Crack had actually healed more than twenty thousand years ago, but because of the affairs in Jingzhou, Ren Qing had been unable to find the time to advance Zhili Technique.
Ren Qing skillfully consumed his lifespan, and the diseased tree in his mind immediately began to grow wildly.
He could sense the Plague Seed celebrating. His flesh and bones gradually underwent Nightmare Demon transformation, and even his soul began to become dreamlike and illusory.
For Ren Qing, advancing his technique to the Heavenly Aberration Realm was even less dangerous than the Ascension Ladder. Even while dividing his attention, he could easily break through the bottleneck.
He opened his eyes and allowed his body and soul to transform between flesh and the Nightmare Demon.
Ren Qing immediately left the ghost ship and plunged headfirst into the Dragon Blood Sea Region. The surface of the sea immediately rippled slightly, and the fish and shrimp fled in all directions.
He moved his arms as he gradually approached the location of Matchmaking Immortal.
At first, he could barely maintain a human form, but soon only distorted, spreading light and shadows remained, making him impossible for ordinary people to identify with the naked eye.
The ripples on the surface of the sea disappeared, but countless bubbles emerged immediately afterward.
The bubbles displayed dazzling colors and remained suspended in the air for several minutes, causing every living creature they touched to fall asleep.
Ren Qing swam faster and faster, reaching the location of Matchmaking Immortal in only a moment.
He closed his eyes and listened to Matchmaking Immortal's faint snoring, as if the latter still possessed a soul and was currently immersed in some beautiful dream.
After transforming into a Nightmare Demon, Ren Qing could easily travel through dreams, and even a True Immortal could not avoid it.
The brilliant light and shadows covering his body suddenly converged, and then dense smoke emerged from deep within his skin, constantly probing the body of Matchmaking Immortal.
When Ren Qing sensed the dream from Matchmaking Immortal's Mud Pellet Palace, he immediately entered it.
He could see the dreams of the many living beings connected to Matchmaking Immortal. There were mortals and cultivators, and even domestic poultry had their souls bound by red threads.
From this, it was evident that Matchmaking Immortal's soul had indeed disappeared. Otherwise, there was no reason for the selection of targets to be so random.
Ren Qing was still in the process of advancing, but the activity of the Strange Object was extremely high.
He took the initiative to shorten the red threads connected to the domestic poultry, while leaving those of the mortals intact. Perhaps they would be useful in the future.
Ren Qing also took a look at Great Dream Perfected Person's condition and discovered that the latter had already begun merging his separated souls, indicating that he intended to use this to break through the bottleneck.
Although he could not contact Great Dream Perfected Person, he still used the memories left behind by Great Dream Perfected Person's separated souls to inform him about the Ascension Ladder.
If possible, Ren Qing hoped to protect Great Dream Perfected Person from the side. Perhaps this would allow him to investigate the secrets of the Three Dao Ancestors.
Of course, the main factor was still Great Dream Perfected Person's own choice.
If Great Dream Perfected Person successfully broke through, he would head to Sanxiang. Ren Qing had deliberately hidden a passage leading to the Stomach World there, and with Great Dream Perfected Person's Double Pupils, he would definitely be able to notice it.
After Ren Qing stopped communicating with Great Dream Perfected Person, his advancement also reached its most critical moment.
The Strange Object of Zhili Technique was called the Plague Dream Tree, which was the diseased tree located in the Mud Pellet Palace.
Under the influence of the Information Flow, the Plague Dream Tree frantically extended its roots and stems, directly piercing into the brain and covering every region.
Ren Qing's aura became unstable, but this was within his expectations. After all, the Heavenly Aberration Realm was mainly about the fusion of body, soul, and Strange Object.
Matchmaking Immortal's Mud Pellet Palace trembled slightly, but under the soothing influence, it soon returned to calm.
Ren Qing found the small Heavenly Court he had constructed earlier, then, in the form of a Nightmare Demon, smoothly traveled into the depths of the dream.
He had cultivated dream techniques for more than a hundred years, but had never entered a dream himself, so he could not help feeling somewhat curious.
The small Heavenly Court in ruins came into view. Vaguely, several Wind Void People cultivators could still be seen patrolling and standing guard inside the Thunder Department's halls.
The Wind Void People had already completely regarded the small Heavenly Court as their ancestral land.
Perhaps Wind Ye was afraid that the small Heavenly Court would suddenly disappear, so members of the tribe were stationed there at all times, worshiping the statue of the Wind God Bo Qiang.
Ren Qing still greatly approved of the Wind Void People's devotion.
He was extremely fortunate that he had been able to find the isolated Wind Void People back then. Otherwise, it would have been difficult to use multiple factions to prove the existence of the Heavenly Court.
Ren Qing endured the discomfort of the Strange Object's fusion and began reinforcing the small Heavenly Court.
It was obviously unrealistic for the small Heavenly Court to withstand the consciousnesses of multiple Heavenly Aberration Realm cultivators. Only by allowing the dream and Matchmaking Immortal to fuse more closely could it display a trace of the power of a True Immortal.
Ren Qing was truly using Matchmaking Immortal as a magical artifact.
After its expansion, the small Heavenly Court easily covered most of Matchmaking Immortal's Mud Pellet Palace. Even if a soul existed there, it would have to be forced out.
During this period, Ren Qing also completed his breakthrough in Zhili Technique.
One had to admit that he was truly bold. Among Yang God Realm cultivators throughout history, Ren Qing was probably the only one who dared to cast techniques while advancing.
[Lifespan: None]
[Techniques: Zhili Technique (Dream Wanderer)]
[Immortal Body: Filthy Plague Dream (Pseudo)]
[Divine Ability: The World Is Like a Dream]
[Immortal Position: Zhili Dream Immortal (Pseudo)]
Ren Qing looked at his arms. Because he maintained his Nightmare Demon transformation, they were still composed of distorted smoke, their colors constantly flickering.
With a thought from Ren Qing, the light and shadows suddenly became restrained and turned as black as ink.
The small Heavenly Court, which had only just stabilized, began collapsing without warning. A continuously sinking black hole appeared in the cloudless sky.
The Wind Void People inside the Thunder Department's halls became extremely frightened and tried to fly toward the black hole.
Before they could approach, they felt their flesh becoming numb, their blood flowing backward, their bones beginning to proliferate, and tumors growing from their joints.
Seeing this, Ren Qing restored his ordinary Nightmare Demon form. The collapse of the small Heavenly Court immediately stopped, and the black hole healed in the blink of an eye.
With a point of his right finger, he erased part of the Wind Void People's memories and used Zhili Technique to strip away their diseases, preventing their conditions from continuing to worsen.
Ren Qing did not want anyone besides himself to know that the Heavenly Court was nothing more than a fabricated lie, created to search for "fellow cultivators" seeking immortality.
The ability he had just displayed was, in a certain sense, precisely the Immortal Body "Filthy Plague Dream."
Zhili Technique had already been able to utilize an Immortal Body during the Dharma-Birth Path, but the power of Filthy Plague Dream had only just entered the Heavenly Aberration Realm.
This was also because of the special nature of Zhili Technique. Its Immortal Body required postnatal growth, making it far inferior to the other four Immortal Positions.
Ren Qing carefully pondered the function of the Immortal Body and quickly reached a conclusion.
Any living creature in the world afflicted by a Plague Seed could faintly establish a connection with Zhili Technique.
Whenever they had nightmares, Filthy Plague Dream would secretly devour their negative emotions, gradually nourishing the Immortal Body and causing it to grow continuously.
Ren Qing had just tried out the Immortal Body Filthy Plague Dream and discovered that its main characteristic was its plague-like destructive power, which could invisibly erode its surroundings.
It did not affect only living creatures. Even the environment would be deeply affected.
If Ren Qing did not cancel the technique, then even if the small Heavenly Court did not collapse, it would be covered by deformed fungi and could even give rise to various diseases.
And this was only shortly after Zhili Technique's breakthrough.
With the support of nearly a million people in the Stomach World, as well as the million inhabitants of Jingzhou, the growth speed of Filthy Plague Dream was beyond imagination.
He felt that Zhili Technique's Immortal Body had something of the Three Dao Ancestors about it.
Even without casting any techniques, it could cause the living creatures that came into contact with it to undergo uncontrolled mutations.
Of course, the mutations brought about by Zhili Technique were more like diseases of the body and soul, and no matter what materials were used, they could not be alleviated.
In the future, once Ren Qing mastered the Immortal Position, he could even completely drag sleeping living creatures into the Bottomless Pit of bodily and spiritual mutation.
He suddenly shuddered. It was difficult to imagine what would happen if he became a Turbid Immortal.
Could he possibly destroy this entire world?
Mortals would no longer be able to dream, because once they fell asleep, their bodies and souls might undergo uncontrolled mutations, and after death they would still be affected by Corpse Fengdu.
"I can barely protect myself, yet I already possess the preliminary ability to destroy the world."
Ren Qing revealed a bitter smile as his gaze swept across the ruins of the small Heavenly Court.
He had previously felt that there were no flaws left, but now he discovered quite a few loopholes. If he did not perfect it, then once the Heavenly Aberration Realm cultivators arrived, the small Heavenly Court would undoubtedly become a joke.
Ren Qing cast Zhili Technique and meticulously modified the Heavenly Court, not even overlooking a single fragment of rubble.
Even if he wanted to piece together the halls, he could accomplish it by relying on the existing wall bricks.
Ren Qing also left behind traces of immortals fleeing the Heavenly Court. If one carefully searched the statues, one could even discover quite a number of Ascension Methods.
Most of the Ascension Methods had only the Yang God Realm as their limit, while only one-third reached the Heavenly Aberration Realm.
A very small number of incomplete fragments were connected to Immortal Positions, such as Old Man Under the Moon, Fortune Virtue Earth Immortal, the Wind God Bo Qiang, and Kui Wood Star Lodge.
The Ascension Method related to Old Man Under the Moon was something Ren Qing had comprehended through Matchmaking Immortal in his spare time. Because he had never formally come into contact with the Immortal Position, the technique he created could not obtain recognition from the Information Flow.
The technique certainly had flaws, but with Ren Qing's knowledge, he could not see them. It was better to remove some of the content and use it to deceive people. It was more than sufficient for that purpose.
The Ascension Method of Fortune Virtue Earth Immortal was actually modified from the Heavenly Dao Method, as the two originally shared the same source.
The Ascension Method of Kui Wood Star Lodge came from the Swallowing Wolf Daoist sealed in the Mirror World, whose cultivation had already reached the level of the Heavenly Aberration Realm.
[Kui Wolf Art]
[Created by the Yellow-Robed Old Demon, its cultivation required one to possess a wolf's body from birth but a human heart. Once one's intelligence matured, one had to feed it the flesh and blood of one's closest relatives in order to cultivate it successfully.]
The upper limit of Kui Wolf Art was the Earth Immortal Realm, and it could not be cultivated alongside other techniques.
[Immortal Position: Kui Wood Star Lodge]
After Ren Qing completed the construction of the small Heavenly Court, his gaze turned toward the empty space in Matchmaking Immortal's Mud Pellet Palace, and he began pondering the full appearance of the Celestial River.
His understanding of the Celestial River was limited to works of film and television, but that did not prevent him from constructing it.
Ren Qing followed the appearance of the Milky Way, placing stars around the Heavenly Court. Each star was a Taoist temple inhabited by Heavenly Soldiers and Heavenly Generals.
However, because it had to fit the ruins, he directly cut the Celestial River in half, leaving tens of thousands of Taoist temples scattered and broken.
Ren Qing hesitated for a moment, then added a large number of traces that appeared after bubbles exploded.
He did not explicitly name the Three Dao Ancestors, but any cultivator who had come into contact with the Heavenly Dao could guess that the Three Dao Ancestors had destroyed the Heavenly Court.
Even Ren Qing, the one who had actually caused it all, felt a sense of magnificent and grand epic history.
Ren Qing once again cast Heavenly Demon Possession. After returning to the inner layer world of Jingzhou, his first reaction was to inspect the deliberately neglected Ghost Shadow.
The Ghost Shadow still appeared to be only several meters in size on the surface, but in reality, its volume had already expanded to seven or eight thousand meters.
Jingzhou itself was beginning to faintly reject the Ghost Shadow. It should not take long for the Ghost Shadow's size to reach the conditions required for ascension.