"I can’t drink anymore! I really can’t!"
In the end, Su Chen had to fake passing out to get away from Wei Zhenghong. It wasn’t until he was carried onto the spaceship and had flown a good distance away that his eyes finally cleared up. He rubbed his face and activated his Permanent Body to boost his metabolism. By rapidly digesting most of the alcohol in his system, he felt increasingly refreshed.
Ever since his return, Wei Zhenghong had clung to him, insisting on throwing a banquet no matter what. Only now did Su Chen finally have a moment of peace.
"The Fog Source..." Su Chen reached out and retrieved the nearly solid Fog Source. The situation outside the Flame Fire had been much better than he expected, so he hadn’t needed to call upon the Great Venerable. "You’ve been craving this for a while, haven’t you? Here you go..."
With a mere thought, he absorbed the Fog Source, sending it sinking into a mysterious, unknown space within his body. Instantly, strings of text surfaced and refreshed across his interface.
[The Great Venerable Red Flame Thunder Resonator has absorbed the Fog Source you gifted him. He feels his entire body expanding and can barely control himself.]
[Thunder Fury (One-time use): Can directly erase the requirements of a specific Main Profession.]
[Wrath of Violent Thunder (One-time use): Can directly erase the requirements of a specific Holy Profession.]
[Venerable Transformation (One-time use): Can temporarily transform into the Great Venerable Red Flame Thunder Resonator.]
More text refreshed on the panel, and Su Chen skimmed through it.
"A reward to erase Holy Profession requirements has finally appeared," Su Chen marveled. A Holy Profession was barely half a step below a Morning Star, and he had never had the chance to bypass their requirements before. He couldn’t help but think, "With this, along with the Red Flame and the perfect Deceitful God Source Power, I now have two short-term opportunities for a Melting Holy Profession. I need to plan this out carefully. But I don’t have enough essence. I’ll see if I can divert some from the league. Old Qing shouldn’t have any objections now."
As for the Venerable Transformation, it was even more intriguing. "It seems this allows me to temporarily become the Great Venerable Red Flame Thunder Resonator myself. That’s far more convenient than summoning the Great Venerable like I did before."
While he was pondering, the interface shifted again—
[The Great Venerable Red Flame Thunder Resonator has become agitated. The Fog Source and the Sun Residual Fire are clashing within his body. An unknown force has intervened to extract them...]
[Opening New Page - Igniting]
[Opening New Page - Casting Profession]
"An unknown force?" Su Chen was quite surprised. He figured this unknown force had to be the interface itself.
The Sun Residual Fire was of an incredibly high caliber and had previously granted him the igniting ability. However, it seemed it had never fully integrated into the Great Venerable, and now it was clashing with the Fog Source. Meanwhile, two new sub-pages appeared on the interface’s normally unchanging display.
The first was Igniting, which was used for Melting Holy Professions out of unobtained classes ahead of time. Su Chen already knew about this.
"But this Casting Profession page... could it be...?" With a flick of his mind, Su Chen slowly opened the Casting Profession page. In the center sat a furnace, completely empty.
Simultaneously, a wave of realization flooded his mind.
"Casting Profession..." Su Chen’s eyes lit up. This feature was roughly what they had imagined: he could indeed use a large number of classes to forge the powerful professions he needed. He could even enhance existing professions or swap out their abilities. However, this could only be done once per profession; doing it again risked a total collapse of its Professional Spirituality. Special professions required Deceitful God Essence, while Holy Professions consumed Source Power.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t use it right now. This feature required an "igniter," which was undeniably meant to be the Great Venerable.
"So the Great Venerable has been reduced to a laborer..." Su Chen grinned, quite satisfied with all the benefits and the updates to his interface. "I just wonder if the Great Venerable can evolve to the Moonlight Tier this time."
He muttered to himself. Logically, Black Tuo—who had created these Fog Ashes—was also at the Moonlight Tier, so it shouldn’t be that easy to spawn a Moonlight Spirit. But based on his understanding, the Fog Ashes were anything but simple. Black Tuo had expended a massive amount of effort to create them. After all, the Bronze Sect’s Flame Fire contained more than just one Moonlight Fire, as well as a large amount of Morning Star fire. For the Fog Ashes to nearly extinguish it all meant its intensity had to be terrifyingly high. He felt there was a decent chance, but no one could say for sure.
"If he can evolve, then using ’Great Venerable, save me’ through Venerable Transformation becomes much more cost-effective. I’ll feel much safer, too."
Su Chen calculated that the Great Venerable’s ability to intervene essentially stemmed from mutations caused by the interface. Even if the Great Venerable’s true body within the interface was incredibly strong, he couldn’t directly affect reality through it. He could only influence the various profession spirits that had been collected.
"No matter how powerful he gets, he’s still shackled by the interface. Good." Su Chen closed the panel. His gaze had already fallen upon the Floating Island Port of his home, where several transport ships were docked.
As soon as he arrived at the port and stepped off his ship, he was greeted by the sight of Lin Langtian standing with his hands behind his back. Beside him lay three metal boxes—one large and two small. The large one was a full two meters long.
Su Chen’s heart stirred. He walked up quickly and greeted, "Lin Zoushou."
Lin Langtian nodded. He glanced at the guards behind him but didn’t seem too concerned. "These are the items Senior Brother Qing Cang asked me to deliver to you. Keep this quiet."
As he spoke, a strange look crossed his face. The corpse of a Morning Star was naturally a precious material, yet he hadn’t expected Qing Cang to just hand it over to Su Chen. Still, he didn’t think the reward was excessive.
"Sorry for the trouble, Lin Zoushou," Su Chen thanked him.
"It’s nothing." Lin Langtian waved it off. Just as he was about to leave, he stopped in his tracks and added, "There is one thing you should know, though."
"Please, tell me," Su Chen said, listening intently.
With an odd expression on his face, Lin Langtian said, "The latest news is that the royal capital was attacked and suffered heavy losses. Of the five Guard Commanders—who are all Double Ninth Tier professionals—three died. Out of the twelve Vice Commanders at Tier Nine, seven were killed. The Moonlight Spirits in their possession were also corrupted by the Fog Ashes."
"What?" A flash of astonishment crossed Su Chen’s eyes. "Someone actually attacked the Royal Court?"
Lin Langtian wondered, "Did someone really attack them?" A glint flickered in his eyes; Su Chen seemed to have anticipated this. A thought crossed his mind before he replied, "The attackers were Zhou Lingtian, the Long River Family, and a Deceitful God."
Su Chen narrowed his eyes. The combination of those three factions seemed incredibly bizarre.
Lin Langtian sighed, "The Royal Court has gone completely mad. The Long River Family seemed well-prepared—all their core members had already evacuated, leaving behind only unimportant assets. Zhou Lingtian’s whereabouts are also unknown." He couldn’t help but shake his head. "If they had known this would happen, they never should have acted the way they did in the first place."
Su Chen furrowed his brows. "That doesn’t add up... The goal of those Morning Stars was definitely to obtain the Moonlight Spirits. That was the only way they could lay the foundation for a Sect-level faction. But now, the Moonlight Spirits are only corrupted by the Fog Ashes and haven’t been taken. For Zhou Lingtian and the Long River Family, this is a massive loss."
There were likely many hidden reasons behind this, and mere speculation wouldn’t uncover the truth. After giving him a brief overview, Lin Langtian took his leave.
Su Chen watched him walk away and muttered to himself, "The Royal Court really took a massive hit this time. Their Moonlight Spirits are tainted by Fog Ashes... Tsk, I hope they can find a second person capable of solving their Fog Ashes problem."
Shifting his focus, Su Chen looked down at the three metal boxes in front of him. He opened the large one and took a quick glance. Inside lay Qin Yun’s corpse. It had been roughly cleaned up; her eyes were tightly shut, and surprisingly, her wounds had healed. The other two boxes naturally contained the twenty drops of Divine Blood and incredibly pure Faith Essence.
"I have enough Divine Blood for a Melting Holy Profession now."
He packed away the Divine Blood and the Faith Essence, then dragged Qin Yun’s corpse into the training room in the main building.
"She’s been dead for less than three days, so Qin Yun meets the requirements..." Su Chen pulled the body out completely. The Residual Spirit had already taught him the specific method.
He then took out ten drops of Divine Blood and arranged them in a circle around Qin Yun’s corpse. "Ten drops of Divine Blood, and five portions of pure Faith Essence."
Su Chen placed the Faith Essence at her limbs and head. "It requires at least a Moonlight Fire as a catalyst. I don’t have Moonlight Fire, but I do have Sun Residual Fire..."
Wisps of purple flame appeared at his fingertips. Using the Divine Blood as fuel, the flames began to burn vigorously. Although this was just Residual Fire and lacked immense destructive power, it had numerous other applications.
Su Chen mumbled under his breath, "...Vast Fire as the catalyst... Refining Technique as the tribute..."
It was a ritual. Even though it consisted of only a few words, it seemed to carry a mysterious power. The flames suddenly surged, spreading across the Faith Essence to form a five-pointed star.
In an instant, blazing flames engulfed Qin Yun’s corpse. The purple fire gradually turned tangerine, radiating heat like a miniature sun. The temperature climbed so high that Su Chen was forced to step back repeatedly, while the metal floor of the training room began to melt.
"That’s quite a commotion," Su Chen said, narrowing his eyes. He was secretly amazed. This ritual was far from simple.
According to the Residual Spirit, this ritual originated from a specific Sun. Even though that entity had already fallen, certain traces of its existence remained forever etched into the fabric of the universe.