📖 Chapter 1024 - Flame Spirit Curse!

13 Jul, 2023

While Xie Haiyang continued his miserable existence, Wang Baole was making progress in the Star-Sealing Art. By now, all the asteroids in the divine ox phantom image had been replaced by Mortal Planets.

This made his technique much stronger, as well as unlocking the third layer of the Star-Sealing Art. However, Wang Baole’s cultivation base was still only in the middle stage of the Planet Realm, so the rapid progress he made in the previous two layers slowed to a crawl. Eventually, his focus shifted from the Star-Sealing Art to the Flame Spirit Curse.

“Flame Spirit, Flame Ghost…” After pondering over the Flame Spirit Curse for a while, Wang Baole patted his forehead.

‘Master, oh Master, did you name this spell randomly? Or did you name your clone randomly? Or is this curse actually related to the old ox…’

After all, the old ox’s name was Flame Ghost, which did indeed seem to have something to do with the “Flame Spirit” part of this Flame Spirit Curse.

But in the end, Wang Baole put the name aside, taking a deep breath before focusing on studying the Flame Spirit Curse. With flame as the foundation, innumerable tiny runes would be constructed, and then with the user’s life as the guide, the curse would be formed!

This was much different from the other curse arts Wang Baole knew about. In general, curse arts mostly borrowed the power of heaven and earth, or some mystical force to affect the enemy’s karma and thus curse them.

Although such curses were indeed powerful, they were ultimately derived from external forces. The curse user’s body was more like a medium used to attract and direct external power.

Isolating such curses wasn’t difficult, and it wasn’t impossible to resolve them completely. If a person was prepared, they could even cause the curse user to receive a karmic backlash.

In general, although curse arts were a quick way to get strong at the beginning, there were too many limitations. For example, although the power of heaven and earth seemed limitless, there was in fact a limit. Moreover, a person’s body itself could only bear a certain amount of power. Thus, curse arts were nothing more than a minor Dao in the Never-Ending Dao Domain. Although many people were skilled in them, almost none were particularly famous.

After all, any methods that couldn’t harm Almighties in the Star Domain and Universe Realms… were useless!

However, the Flame Patriarch’s curse arts used his own life and will as fuel for the curse. To a certain extent, it could be described as slaying a thousand enemy soldiers at the cost of eight hundred of your own. This was why the price of the Flame Patriarch’s three great curses was his own death.

However, the benefits were just as astonishing as the price. First of all, a person’s hopes were limitless, and their resentment was also limitless. To a certain extent, emotions were limitless by nature, so the curse, too, could be considered limitless!

Moreover, once the Flame Patriarch’s curse was unleashed, it was almost impossible to block or isolate it. As for resolving it… since the curse came from the user’s inextinguishable resentment and unsuppressible hopes, not from the power of heaven and earth, each curse was unique and could only be broken by its caster!

After carefully studying the Flame Spirit Curse, Wang Baole’s eyes flickered with a profound light, and he fell into deep thought. A while later, he took a deep breath and murmured.

“This technique isn’t for people who live good lives… Instead, it’s more suitable for people who constantly fight against adversity. The more miserable their lives, the more grievances they have, the more inextinguishable their resentment will be… Master must have faced innumerable obstacles in his life and let out helpless roars countless times. In the end, he created this curse art that even Divine Emperors are scared of!

“And the more a person practices this technique, the more extreme their personality will become. At the same time, their temperament will turn gloomy… That’s why Master gave me the Star-Sealing Art first. He wants me to cultivate a domineering spirit, and use that as a buffer against the gloominess and extremity that comes from this Flame Spirit Curse…

“But this technique has another disadvantage, namely that it requires endless vitality. After all, the premise of the Flame Spirit Curse is to slay a thousand enemy soldiers at the price of eight hundred of my own. Thus, to use it consistently, I need enough vitality that its consumption becomes negligible.”

Wang Baole fell silent. He recalled what his master said; in half a year, he would have to go and pay respects to Reverend Heaven-Learned, and his master had bought him a chance at heaven’s mandate.

Although Wang Baole didn’t know what exactly the so-called “chance at heaven’s mandate” was, from the way things were going, he could hazard a guess.

“The pinnacle of vitality… isn’t that none other than heaven itself?” Wang Baole muttered. Soon, a trace of doubt appeared in his eyes, and it quickly spread until it burrowed deep into his heart.

“But this curse art is obviously one that needs the user to face adversity throughout their life. Only with inextinguishable resentment can it be cultivated more smoothly… Why would Master have me learn it?” Wang Baole fell silent for a while. Thus far, although his life couldn’t be considered absolutely smooth sailing, it also couldn’t be considered one where he faced strong adversity. Logically speaking, the Flame Spirit Curse wasn’t suitable for him to cultivate.

“Could it be that Master knows something that he can’t tell me? … I’m probably just thinking too much.” Wang Baole shook his head. He could feel his master’s sincerity toward him.

“A person will always encounter obstacles in their life. Master must be hoping that this technique will give me the strength to overcome those obstacles when I meet them. Thus, when things go well, I can grow stronger, and when I face occasional adversity, I can still grow stronger! I guess it can be considered a kind of insurance.” After thinking it over, Wang Baole felt that this was probably the reason. Thus, he calmed down and began cultivating this Flame Spirit Curse.

Due to his personality and general lack of resentment, Wang Baole’s progress wasn’t fast. However, he was persistent. After realizing that this technique was insurance, he placed even more importance on cultivating it. In the following days, although his progress was slow, he still immersed his mind in cultivation, familiarizing himself with the curse art and repeatedly integrating his vitality into the tiny flame runes.

Just like that, three months passed quickly. When there were only three months remaining until Wang Baole had to depart to celebrate Reverend Heaven-Learned’s birthday, Xie Haiyang finally finished grooming the divine ox.

The reason he was so much faster than Wang Baole’s initial estimate was that Xie Haiyang seemed to have understood something. He flattered the old ox day in and day out, ensuring that it was happy at all times. Originally, the old ox had planned to gradually expand its body as time went on, but under Xie Haiyang’s incessant flattery, it slowly shrank instead.

After he finished grooming the old ox, the exhausted Xie Haiyang paid a visit to Wang Baole with strong indignation in his eyes.

“Sixteenth Sect Uncle, tell me, Grandmaster punished me because Fifteenth Sect Uncle went to snitch on me, right?!”

Wang Baole coughed awkwardly. In his heart, he actually sympathized with Xie Haiyang, but the words he spoke with a solemn face were completely different.

“What are you suspecting your Fifteenth Sect Uncle for? At the end of the day, it’s all because of your resentful heart!”

“I… It must be Fifteenth! He got me drunk and deliberately set me up, then went and snitched to Grandmaster!!” Xie Haiyang was full of grief and indignation. Right now, he felt that his only allies here in the Raging Flame Galaxy were his master and Wang Baole. Just as he was about to go off on another tirade, someone else arrived at Wang Baole’s pagoda.

The newcomer was none other than Wang Baole’s Seventh Senior Brother. His face was bruised and swollen, covered with dried blood that made him look extremely miserable. After entering the pagoda, he directly ignored Xie Haiyang and let out a sorrowful wail.

“Little Sixteenth, I came uninvited today precisely to ask you for a single favor.”

Seeing Seventh Senior Brother’s miserable appearance, Wang Baole felt a headache coming on. He secretly thought that his master was playing around again, but Xie Haiyang, who didn’t know the truth of the Raging Flame Galaxy, was shocked by Seventh Senior Brother’s appearance.

“Seventh Sect Uncle, what happened to you?”

“What happened? Isn’t it just that I was beaten up by your Grandmaster?” Seventh Senior Brother shot Xie Haiyang a displeased glance before turning back to Wang Baole.

“Sixteenth, take this. It’s my last will and testament. If Master ends up beating me to death one day, you have to send it back to my hometown, okay?” Speaking in a despondent voice, Seventh Senior Brother handed Wang Baole a jade slip before turning and leaving the pagoda.

Wang Baole held the jade slip, not knowing whether to laugh or to cry. Beside him, Xie Haiyang blinked and suddenly ran out of the tower, chasing after Seventh Senior Brother despite Wang Baole calling for him to come back…

‘Haiyang, ah Haiyang, he’s digging a hole for you again. I hope you don’t fall into it this time…’ Wang Baole was speechless. Seeing that Xie Haiyang had already disappeared, he could only sigh and put the jade slip aside, returning to his meditation. At the same time, he lamented that his master was too evil. He had obviously seen that Wang Baole wouldn’t be caught in his traps, so he changed his target to Xie Haiyang.

While Wang Baole resumed his study of the Flame Spirit Curse, Xie Haiyang had already caught up with Seventh Senior Brother, who was walking with a limp.

“Seventh Sect Uncle, please wait! What did you do, that Grandmaster beat you up so badly?”

Seventh Senior Brother paused and turned his head, glaring at Xie Haiyang with obvious hostility.

“What, Little Haiyang, do you also want to be like Fifteenth? Tricking me into speaking ill of your Grandmaster, then running over and snitching!”

Xie Haiyang’s whole body trembled. Looking at his Seventh Sect Uncle’s miserable form, he suddenly felt that they were two tragic fellows in the same boat.