Instantly, the terrifying tension broke. The Patriarch immediately slumped forward, his heavy, exhausted sigh echoing across the vast underground space.
Panting heavily, the Patriarch slowly reined in the violent burst of blue flames. With meticulous control, he guided the cool, ethereal fire back into his torn back in a desperate bid to soothe the scorching, relentless pain that still lingered deep within his forty-five-thousand-year-old bones.
"Here comes the most difficult part," Mo Lingtian muttered to himself as the spine meridian levitated before him, wrapped tightly within his void energy.
The Patriarch slowly turned around, watching Mo Lingtian as he continued to levitate the spine meridian with void energy, an energy the Patriarch had never seen before.
"What are you going to do next?" he asked Mo Lingtian weakly.
"First, I have to use a flame energy to force out the deviation energy hiding deep within it," Mo Lingtian said, summoning the dark-greyish death flame in his right hand.
"What kind of energy is that?" the Patriarch asked, his eyebrows furrowing in suspicion. Apart from the void energy wrapped around his spine meridian, this flame was yet another type of power he had never encountered.
"I would have borrowed your blue flame to refine and force out the deviant energy. But as you said, the Qi deviation happened a long time ago. If your blue flame could do the job, you would have forced out most of the deviation by now," Mo Lingtian explained, noticing the Patriarch's suspicious stare.
"Never mind. For someone as shrewd as you, if you really wanted to harm me, the extraction process would have been the best time," the Patriarch conceded with a heavy sigh. He continued to circulate the soothing heat of the blue flame around his hollowed back to ease the lingering pain.
With a rapid push of his hand forward, Mo Lingtian set the spine meridian ablaze with the death flame. As powerful as the death flame was, it couldn't instantly corrode the meridian of a Sovereign Immortal, but it could transfer its unique, corrosive heat all through the insides, making it incredibly uncomfortable for the deviation energy to remain hidden.
Mo Lingtian retracted the void energy wrapped around the spine meridian and arched his fingers, increasing the intensity of the death flame as its dark-greyish energy swirled more violently around the crystalline structure.
Suddenly, from deep within the liquid gold trapped inside the translucent meridian, a green phantom parasite slowly emerged. It writhed about, moving frantically within the confined space of the meridian.
"This... this is the source of the Qi deviation," the Patriarch gasped when he saw the parasite. "What is this thing? Is this how Qi deviation energy should look?" he continued, expressing absolute shock over the physical, living form in which the deviation had manifested.
"Fool," Mo Lingtian thought, cursing the Patriarch in his mind as he continued to heat the meridian with the death flame.
"According to the books I read in the devil clan, Qi deviation only happens when cultivators practice cultivation methods the wrong way. What you practiced wasn't even a cultivation method. You just blindly practiced unorganized lines of characters that led to the opportunity where the true cultivation lay," he continued analyzing silently.
"Whatever this is, this is not Qi deviation energy. I don't even know what you've formed in there," Mo Lingtian concluded inwardly as he continued to steadily heat the spine meridian.
"Why isn't it coming out?" the Patriarch asked, anxiously observing the squirming green phantom parasite.
"What kind of creature is this..." Mo Lingtian suddenly exclaimed, narrowing his eyes as he drastically increased the intensity of the death flame. Even the Patriarch had to slightly shift his face away as ambient fragments of the corrosive heat reached him.
"What happened?" the Patriarch asked, his curiosity peaking over Lingtian's sudden outburst.
"This thing seems to be adjusting to the heat of my flame. It is no longer being affected by it," Mo Lingtian replied grimly.
"What do you mean? Didn't you say you figured out a way to correct Qi deviation?" the Patriarch demanded, relentlessly questioning Mo Lingtian as the young cultivator continued to pump intensity into the death flame.
"Yes, I did. But this is not Qi deviation... this is something else," Mo Lingtian stated. He calmly retracted the death flame, leaving the spine meridian levitating silently in the space between them.
"So what do we do now? You've already extracted my meridian. If it is inserted back like this, the backlash will only grow worse," the Patriarch said, slowly tapping his forehead with a finger in mounting frustration.
"What was I thinking? How could a mere Vessel Cleansing Stage cultivator possibly cure a Sovereign Immortal?" the Patriarch muttered to himself. He bowed his head and closed his eyes, unwilling to accept his grim fate.
After a tense, suffocating silence, Mo Lingtian finally spoke.
The Patriarch immediately raised his head, looking up at him as a desperate rush of hope flooded his heart.
"Senior, can I trust you?" Mo Lingtian asked, bowing his head as he closed his eyes.
"In the demon continent, there is no absolute trust, only partnerships," the Patriarch replied, narrowing his eyes as he waited for Mo Lingtian's next words.
"I have one more way to solve this creature. But... it involves a secret that could get me killed if it is exposed," Mo Lingtian said, slowly raising his head to lock eyes directly with the Patriarch.
"Lingtian, I believe you already weighed the pros and cons before mentioning this. If I don't correct this Qi deviation, it will only be a matter of time before it finally kills me. And you will not be able to leave here alive if we find no cure today," the Patriarch stated in a low, dangerous tone.
"It seems like I have no choice. If I don't cure the Patriarch, on one hand, this old monster won't let me leave so easily. On the other hand, the Eclipsed Sun Sect won't rise, and I won't have a safe haven in the wilderness anymore. By then, it will only be a matter of time before the three factions realize the Chief Commander cannot easily interfere to protect me, and they will take the initiative to kill me," Mo Lingtian thought rapidly before finally making his decision.
"Since I don't have much chance to live even if I escape from this place unscathed, I had better just do it," Mo Lingtian said to the Patriarch. He slowly brought his two palms together, generating a slow, deliberate motion of death energy around his arms.
The moment his palms touched, the Death Domain opened. It instantly enveloped the entire ethereal cultivation space, expanding all the way to the edge of the underground mountain. Only the faint sense of scorching extreme Yang heat deep within the bottomless pit prevented the Death Domain from spreading any further.
"Is this the mysterious secret you were talking about? I thought you were about to blow my mind with something," the Patriarch said, studying the massive, dark dome that had spread across them.
"Is this not just a virtual domain? There are several genius immortals who can open one. There is no way I would covet a mere virtual domain when I already possess a true law domain."
"Does this old monster really not notice the quality of my domain? Or is he just pretending?" Mo Lingtian thought to himself. He brought his hands down, looking at the Death Domain he had opened, and then back at the Patriarch.
"Alright, what is the way you found?" the Patriarch asked, looking visibly unimpressed by the Death Domain.
"Senior, whatever happens after this, I want you to trust me..." Mo Lingtian said as his two palms immediately ignited with roaring death flames.
"Do what you have to do," the Patriarch answered, sheer anxiousness and absolute determination written all over his face.
No matter the price, if there was a way to correct this Qi deviation, he was willing to pay it. There was no way he would allow forty-five thousand years of cultivation to just go to waste because he was unwilling to pay the price.