"Treatise on Heavenly Treasures."
Cost: 2000 contribution points.
Without even blinking, Fan Lin made the purchase.
He carefully began to peruse the contents.
Heavenly Treasures were key to a cultivator's foundation. They could be categorized into three main types: Celestial Treasures, Earthly Treasures, and Human Treasures.
Celestial Treasures were mysterious and elusive, closely aligned with the heavens, and were rarely encountered. The book only gave one example: the foundation of the Ten Thousand Immortals Alliance.
Yanfa Jue [1].
The specific owner of this Foundation Treasure remained unknown. Its special effect allowed the spontaneous generation of new techniques day and night.
When Fan Lin read this, he stopped and thought, "Previously, I heard from Kou Hong that the cultivation techniques that cultivators use nowadays were all newly created techniques. I assumed that there must be some genius who was capable of inventing so many diverse techniques."
"But it's not a result of human innovation; it's reliant on this Heavenly Treasure."
Fan Lin pondered this revelation and continued reading.
Earthly Treasures were rare as well, but they were less elusive than Celestial Treasures. They often appeared alongside extraordinary natural phenomena. The book gave some examples.
The disappearance of the Cangwu Province's four rivers and twenty-eight mountains left behind a seemingly bottomless abyss and led to the creation of the Cangwu Landscape Map Earthly Treasure.
The continent's water system, which originally flowed from west to east into the sea, suddenly reversed one year, with all waters converging at Penglai Mountain, which persisted for three months, leading to the emergence of the World Water Mother.
Fan Lin found this information engrossing and thought, "Does that mean the Canghai Pearl is also an earthly wonder?" It was still more than a decade before the emergence of the Canghai Pearl, and it appeared to be near Flowing Cloud Island. He couldn't afford to forget about this matter.
Next, there was the category of Human Treasures. The majority of Heavenly Treasures in the world belonged to this category. They often formed over several thousand years from the remains of fallen cultivators and could be classified into three grades based on their quality: upper, middle, and lower grades. The higher the quality, the more powerful a cultivator could become by using them.
Fan Lin couldn't help but think of the Gnarled Dragon Branch and the Rust Sword Dao Xuan. He wondered what grade these two wonders were. Based on their displayed power, they were at least of medium grade.
As Fan Lin's clone delved deep into the secrets of the cultivation world, the main body, Li Fan, was quietly traversing the teleportation array to reach Liuli Island. He didn't encounter He Zhenghao but instead met a stranger guarding the island's large formation. He suspected that He Zhenghao was still exploring the cave and hadn't returned yet.
Fan Lin didn't think too much about it and merely nodded to the guardian. He then exited the formation, concealed his presence, and silently arrived at Captain Zhang Haobo's home.
Seeing Zhang Haobo fast asleep, Fan Lin smiled faintly.
Nineteen years remained until the burning of the sea.
With the clone now complete, some preparations could be made in advance. Fan Lin activated the Cloud Water Illusory Dream Art.
Zhang Haobo abruptly awoke from a terrifying nightmare, drenched in cold sweat. He was panting heavily, and the fear in his heart had yet to subside.
After a while, he finally regained his senses, gazing around at the unfamiliar surroundings.
Where was he... Liuli Island?
Could it be that everything was just a terrible nightmare?
But when had he ever had such vivid dreams?
In the dream, he had once gone fishing at sea and pulled up a corpse, along with a book. Even after being submerged in seawater for a long time, the text on the pages remained clear.
"Sea Fixing Sword Technique."
It was a cultivation secret technique from the ancient Cloud Water Heavenly Palace, capable of carrying practitioners through to the Foundation Establishment stage. With it, twenty-four Sea Fixing Swords could be condensed in the dantian, making it exceptionally powerful.
With this secret technique, he had made significant progress in just over a decade.
All the way from an ordinary person to reaching the late Qi Condensation stage.
Originally, he had hoped to build his foundation, but he hadn't expected...
Whenever Zhang Haobo thought about the terrifying scenes in his dream, he couldn't help but shudder uncontrollably.
In the sky above the Cong Yun Sea, a sudden appearance emerged—a translucent figure of crimson.
In its hand, there was a seemingly feeble flame.
But it was this very flame that, in the subsequent ten years, slowly evaporated the entire expanse of the Cong Yun Sea.
His relatives, his homeland, and everything around him were utterly obliterated by it.
The cultivators of Ten Thousand Immortals Island fought desperately against it, but unfortunately, the power of that figure was overwhelming.
Moreover, its appearance had been so sudden.
The Cong Yun Sea had turned into an impassable dead zone.
Without reinforcements, eventually, the cultivators on Ten Thousand Immortals Island fought with all their might, only managing to severely injure it.
Rolling flames descended from the sky, turning Ten Thousand Immortals Island into ashes.
The nightmare ended at this point, but Zhang Haobo couldn't calm down for a long time.
Was it truly just a dream?
How could he, an ordinary person, dream so vividly about Ten Thousand Immortals Island, the Tianxuan Mirror, and other things that hadn't even existed in his imagination before?
And even the cultivation techniques...
Wait a minute.
Zhang Haobo's eyes narrowed.
The cultivation technique "Sea Fixing Sword Technique" suddenly emerged in his mind!
Every word, every sentence was crystal clear.
He abruptly stood up.
It wasn't a dream?!
Could it be...
Rebirth?!
He had read quite a few novels in the past, which included plots of dying and returning to the past decades ago.
But he never thought he would experience such a thing himself one day.
It took Zhang Haobo a long time to calm down.
He made an effort to recall his previous life's experiences.
Unfortunately, perhaps because the terrifying crimson figure had overwhelmed his entire consciousness, he only had a vague impression of major events from his past life.
However...
It was enough.
He turned to look at his sleeping wife. His gaze became firm.
The tragedy would occur in a little over ten years.
If he prepared in advance and made arrangements, he could undoubtedly kill that crimson figure.
First and foremost, he had to break through to the early Qi Condensation stage.
Then, he would join the Ten Thousand Immortals Alliance.
The matter of rebirth was too strange to be revealed to others.
He also needed to find a way to make the Ten Thousand Immortals Alliance believe that the crimson figure would truly appear.
Zhang Haobo recovered the mindset of the late stage Qi Condensation cultivator from his previous life. His mind was constantly calculating.
...
Li Fan watched as Zhang Haobo's expression continued to change and, seeing that he didn't immediately try to escape, he nodded in secret.
Zhang Haobo's belief in his rebirth was naturally the result of Li Fan's Cloud Water Illusory Dream Art.
Using his real future experiences as a blueprint, Li Fan constructed an illusion to deceive an ordinary person, which was already more than sufficient.
Unfortunately, Li Fan's current level of cultivation was still shallow, and even though he had experienced events from the future, he couldn't know everything.
So, the illusion he created still had some flaws.
In order to increase the credibility of the illusion, Li Fan even brought out the "Sea Fixing Sword Technique," which had been truncated to the Foundation Establishment stage.
The purpose was to have Zhang Haobo, in his stead, drive the Ten Thousand Immortals Alliance to confront the Crimson Flame.
Li Fan wanted to know how the various cultivators on Ten Thousand Immortals Island would react if they knew in advance about the arrival of the Heavenly Spirit.
Of course, to prevent Zhang Haobo from being frightened by the Crimson Flame's power and choosing to escape immediately, Li Fan implanted some psychological suggestions into his mind, making him feel a sense of responsibility to prevent the tragedy from happening for the sake of his family and comrades.
At the same time, he made modifications to the Crimson Flame's strength, making it appear less invincible and more susceptible to defeat.
Now, it seemed like the effect was quite good.
In the future, Li Fan planned to periodically return to strengthen the illusion using the Cloud Water Illusory Dream Art.
With these thoughts in mind, Li Fan employed Formless Killing Intent to secretly lock onto Zhang Haobo to prevent him from slipping away unnoticed.
*****
[1] Yanfa Jue translates roughly to Technique Derivation Jade.