Published at 19th of March 2025 5:10 pm

Chapter 1240: Corpse Severance Talisman

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"There should no chance that he was able to survive my Cardinal Heavenly Lightning," Han Li said as he struggled to his feet, but as soon as he did so, he was overcome by a rush of feebleness, and his legs gave out from under him as he fell back into a seated position.

Lan Yan hurriedly rushed over to Han Li's side to lend him her support, but he waved her off and said, "Don't worry about me. I'm just a little overexerted, I'll be fine after some rest."

With that, he sat back down again with his legs crossed to rest and recuperate.

Lan Yan heaved an internal sigh of relief upon seeing this, and she remained by Han Li's side as she looked up at the already completely collapsed ceiling of the underground space. A ray of sunlight was spilling down from above, shining directly down upon her, casting a long shadow that stretched all the way to Han Li's side.

Meanwhile, Weeping Soul had just devoured the final bit of ghostly qi in the air before giving a pleased burp as she reverted back to her human form.

She then made her way over to the thick book for a closer examination, leaving Han Li to rest on his own.

Lan Yan was just about to approach her, but she had only just raised a foot when her body abruptly stiffened, and an incredulous look flashed through her eyes.

Somehow, she was moving, but her shadow remained rooted to the spot.

All of a sudden, a burst of black light erupted out of her stagnant shadow, and a figure sprang out from within, holding a sharp dagger that it was plunging directly toward Han Li's chest.

The figure was none other than Gui Lingzi, and this was such an abrupt turn of events that before either Lan Yan or Weeping Soul had a chance to react, the tip of the dagger was already no more than several inches away from Han Li's chest.

All the while, Han Li's eyes remained closed in a seemingly oblivious manner.

Gui Lingzi's eyes were wide open, and a faint flush had appeared on his pale face from excitement.

However, right at this moment, the seemingly defenseless Han Li's eyes suddenly sprang open, and a cold sneer also appeared on his face as he scoffed, "I knew you wouldn't give up so easily..."

At the same time, his hand shot forth like lightning with arcs of golden lightning flashing over its palm, and he was able to close his hand around Gui Lingzi's throat in the blink of an eye.

The tip of Gui Lingzi's dagger had already made contact with Han Li's chest, but it was unable to pierce into his body at all, and Gui Lingzi murmured in an incredulous voice, "How?"

"I knew that attack wouldn't have been enough to kill you. If you had fled the scene, then I would've let you go. However, you simply couldn't help yourself and struck at the first sign of weakness that I displayed, so you have no one to blame but yourself," Han Li sneered.

"You wouldn't dare to kill me! This is the Nine Origins Temple!" Gui Lingzi exclaimed.

"I've already prepared myself for all types of potential scenarios prior to coming here. Right now, it would be easy for me to kill you in your current state, but I'll hold off until I've searched your soul," Han Li said, and a translucent thread shot out of his glabella before piercing into Gui Lingzi's glabella.

At the same time, he began to channel his Spirit Refinement Technique in preparation to force his way into Gui Lingzi's consciousness.

Even before Han Li's spiritual sense had entered Gui Lingzi's consciousness, the latter's voice suddenly rang out in his consciousness.

"You think you can search my soul? What a joke! Now that you're here, please accept this gift from me!"

A sense of foreboding welled up in Han Li's heart upon hearing this, and he immediately withdrew his spiritual sense before opening his eyes.

Right as he did so, a strange, purple talisman came drifting out of Gui Lingzi's glabella, and it imploded into a purple rune that flew directly into his glabella.

Immediately thereafter, Han Li was struck by a burst of unprecedentedly excruciating pain in his head.

Even with his tremendous pain tolerance, this agony was too much to bear, and he involuntarily released Gui Lingzi, then clasped his hands to his own head as he began rolling around in pain.

Gui Lingzi immediately sprang back in retreat to open up some distance between the two of them.

"What did you do?" Weeping Soul yelled in a furious manner.

"I gave him a precious gift. I was saving that Corpse Severance Talisman for myself. The talisman is more useful for a late-Great Encompassment cultivator than any dao pills or spirit medicines, but on an early-Great Encompassment cultivator..."

Gui Lingzi's voice trailed off here as he erupted into raucous laughter.

"Undo what you did!" Weeping Soul demanded as she launched herself at him, only for Gui Lingzi to dissipate into a cloud of ghostly mist.

The injuries that he had suffered in his battle against Han Li had been extremely severe. Even if he could somehow maintain his current cultivation base, there was most likely no chance that he would ever be able to reach the late-Great Encompassment Stage.

If it wasn't for that, he wouldn't have been willing to bestow his Corpse Severance Talisman upon Han Li.

All of a sudden, a blood-curdling howl rang out as Han Li abruptly sprang to his feet, then stood rooted to the spot like a spear that had plunged into the ground.

Weeping Soul immediately moved to rush to his side, but Lan Yan stopped her in her tracks as she cautioned, "Don't go near him!"

Upon being stopped by Lan Yan, Weeping Soul was able to catch a clear glimpse of Han LIi, and only then did she notice that something was clearly very wrong.

Two expressions had appeared on his face at once, presenting a very unsettling sight to behold.

The left half of his face wore a malicious smile, while the right half of his face was twisted in agony and suffering.

"What's wrong with you, Master?" Weeping Soul yelled in alarm.

Han Li turned slightly to face Weeping Soul as if he had heard her question, and it seemed that the right half of his face wanted to answer, but the left half of his face refused to budge, and as a result, he was unable to speak.

"This is really bad..." Lan Yan murmured to herself with a grim expression.

All of a sudden, Han Li let loose an agonized roar as he suddenly rushed forward, as if to tackle Weeping Soul and Lan Yan.

An alarmed and fearful look appeared in Lan Yan's eyes as she reflexively stumbled back a few steps , but in the next instant, Han Li abruptly stopped cold in his tracks and began rolling around again with his hands clawing at his own head.

"What did he do to Master? I can sense that even his soul has become unstable!" Weeping Soul exclaimed in an alarmed voice.

"He used a Corpse Severance Talisman on him," Lan Yan replied with a grim expression.

"What's that?" Weeping Soul asked in an agitated manner.

"The Corpse Severance Talisman is one of the most precious talismans in the entire True Immortal Realm, and it's one of the only known devices that can help a Great Encompassment cultivator sever a corpse soul," Lan Yan explained.

"How does that work? Isn't one supposed to only be able to sever corpse souls upon reaching the pinnacle of the three Great Encompassment Stage cultivation ranks?" Weeping Soul asked in a puzzled manner.

"That's right, and therein lies the problem. Right now, Fellow Daoist Han is still quite far away from the pinnacle of the early-Great Encompassment Stage, so he's not prepared to sever a corpse soul at all, but he's been forced to do so by the Corpse Severance Talisman," Lan Yan explained.

A horrified look appeared on Weeping Soul's face as the implications of the situation finally dawned on her after hearing Lan Yan's explanation.

Indeed, just as Lan Yan had said, despite the rapid progress that Han Li had been making in his cultivation of late, he was still far from the pinnacle of the Great Encompassment Stage, making him severely underqualified to sever his first corpse soul.

On top of that, all Great Encompassment cultivators would go out of their way to make extensive preparations before each corpse soul severance, and even then, there were many reasons that could lead to a failed severance. Even if one could complete a successful severance, there was a very high chance of backlash, potentially resulting in cultivation base regression or even death.

Hence, this priceless Corpse Severance Talisman was most definitely a curse rather than a blessing for Han Li.

In his current state, there was naturally no way that he could successfully sever a corpse soul, so he was doomed to suffer an excruciating demise.

"Is there any way to stop the process?" Weeping Soul asked.

"Once a Corpse Severance Talisman has been activated, it cannot be stopped. It'll be up to Fellow Daoist Han to suppress the effects of the talisman on his own," Lan Yan replied in a grim manner, but she was already aware that there was no way an early-Great Encompassment cultivator would be capable of suppressing the power of a Corpse Severance Talisman.

Right at this moment, Han Li suddenly sprang up from the ground again, and in the blink of an eye, he had already rushed over to Weeping Soul, who only had time to reflexively cross her forearms in front of herself to form a protective barrier before Han Li made a grab for her.

Weeping Soul could see that Han Li's entire face had been twisted into a sinister facade, and that his lips were stretched wide into an exaggerated grin, while drool was trickling down from their corners.

"Your aura seems to be very closely interconnected to his," the malicious Han Li remarked, and in the next instant, Weeping Soul felt a burst of mountainous power crash into her.

Her arms were almost shattered upon impact, and she was sent tumbling through the ruins of the underground space like a cannonball, leaving a deep trench in the ground in her wake.

She finally drew to a halt after crashing into a massive stone wall, and she hurriedly clasped a hand over her own mouth, but was still unable to hold back the blood gushing out from within.

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