Chapter 1645

Inside the sovereign immortal aperture, Fang Yuan reaches the crucial point of refining a huge half completed Spring Autumn Cicada. His long-prepared killer move summons hundreds of dark ghost hands that pull impurities out of it, shrinking it and smoothing its surface. The method is his own, with rank eight Soul Beast Token as its core, and it leaves some flaws behind. Next he tosses a basin-sized lump of phoenix song flame, a rank eight immortal material, onto the cicada. The flames burn off emerging ghost qi, and he waits calmly until all of it is gone and the surface has melted. This step demands extremely high precision. ^{ch. 1645}

A huge dragon-shaped blizzard then lands on the cicada, overpowers its flames and freezes it in ice, and the stubborn flame dissipates only after a few hours. Fang Yuan melts the ice with warm breath and pinches the palm-sized cicada. Its surface cracks, and a rank seven Spring Autumn Cicada awakens and flies out. Success comes after many failures. ^{ch. 1645}

His ghost hand purification method fuses great thief ghost hand with Soul Beast Token but leaves ghost qi, which phoenix song flame removes while tempering the cicada. The dragon blizzard is his modification of slumbering lightning python. Slumbering lightning python is one of refinement path’s four publicly recognized strongest killer moves for handling immortal materials. He plans to use the rank seven cicada as the core of an immortal killer move against another Heavenly Court trap in the River of Time. Heavenly Court ambushed him there last time by deceiving the cicada while it was only rank six. ^{ch. 1645}

The best result would pair the rank seven cicada with a supplementary rank eight spring Gu as a rank eight immortal killer move. Raising the cicada to rank eight is too hard, since he cannot yet refine rank eight Immortal Gu, his refinement path foundation being shaky and his finances lacking. With his wealth from extorting Southern Border experts and the Five Xiangs’ inheritance, his foundation could be said to rival some super forces, and he still has dozens of Immortal Gu. Weak subordinates are his only shortcoming. He would match a true super force once Hei Lou Lan and the others reach rank seven, together with the three enslaved Qi clan Gu Immortals. ^{ch. 1645}

He can give some resources of rank six and seven to Ying Wu Xie and the others, then refine Immortal Gu, since most of those he uses extensively are still rank six. Most important are Landscape as Before, Man as Before and day Gu, and raising these three time path Immortal Gu would greatly lift his time path strength. He regrets that Lang Ya Sect went to Longevity Heaven, since he used it too conveniently and must now spend his own time refining. Raising an Immortal Gu’s rank has a low success rate. Rank seven is harder than rank six. A failure might destroy the rank six Immortal Gu and force him to refine it again, and if someone else refined it meanwhile he would truly lose everything. ^{ch. 1645}