As he spoke, the remnant soul of Ancient Tyrant Pill Sovereign began to burn completely.
“Yes, Sir!” Leo responded quickly.
Ancient Tyrant Pill Sovereign’s remnant soul showed a relieved smile as he looked at the temporarily imprisoned Sea Serpent King.
He formed the final hand seal with his hands.
“Old brat, you dare to seal me! When I get out, I will make the human world face a catastrophe!” Sea Serpent King roared angrily in threat.
Ancient Tyrant Pill Sovereign’s remnant soul ignored Sea Serpent King’s anger and threats, and completed the hand seal.
A huge suction force emanated from the mouth of the pill furnace, enveloping Sea Serpent King.
“Old brat, you dare…!”
Amidst Sea Serpent King’s furious roars, his massive body began to shrink rapidly. Then, in his struggle, he turned into a stream of light and was sucked into the pill furnace.
Immediately after, the huge lid of the furnace closed automatically. The entire pill furnace stood upright, shrank to about ten feet, and landed on the central stone platform below.
After the array patterns on the surface of the pill furnace disappeared, nine sea-blue flame chains could be seen wrapped around it.
At this moment, Ancient Tyrant Pill Sovereign’s remnant soul had turned into wisps of blue smoke and dispersed with the wind.
“Sir…!” Leo’s face showed a hint of sadness.
“Damned humans, let me out!” came Sea Serpent King’s muffled roar from within the pill furnace.
Leo’s voice turned icy, “Sea Serpent King, stay inside obediently. Once I refine the Nether Flame, I’ll deal with you!”
With that, Leo formed a hand seal with his right hand. A hundred Formation Flags flew out from his Storage Sack, surrounding the pill furnace.
The spiritual power threads between the Formation Flags connected, forming a spatial array that completely concealed the pill furnace.
Leo did this to prevent the sea monsters from discovering Sea Serpent King sealed inside the pill furnace.
After setting up the array, Leo felt a strong sense of exhaustion wash over him. By now, his spiritual power was almost completely depleted.
In his current state, he certainly couldn’t dive beneath the lake to find the source of the Nether Flame.
What Leo needed to do now was to restore his condition.
At this moment, there were no other Cultivators or sea monsters around. The air still carried a faint scent of blood.
Leo reached into his Storage Sack with his right hand and took out a pill bottle. He poured five Primordial Spirit Pills into his mouth and then took out two High-Quality Spirit Stones.
Sitting cross-legged on the spot, Leo closed his eyes and began to cultivate using Nine Transformations of the Stars.
As Leo cultivated, not only did the energy from the Spirit Stones and pills flow into him, but also the spiritual energy from heaven and earth continuously poured into his body.
In his dantian, the exhausted spiritual power began to regenerate. The originally dim golden core gradually became bright again.
Time passed by slowly as the sun set in the west.
Until the afterglow of the sunset fell on Leo’s body, he finally exhaled softly and slowly opened his eyes.
As he stood up from the ground, an invisible powerful aura emanated from Leo.
Not only had Leo recovered to his peak state, but due to the previous battle, his cultivation had also improved significantly.
At this moment, Leo’s eyes burned with determination as he looked at the lake filled with sea-blue flames outside the central stone platform.
With a light tap of his toes, Leo’s figure flashed and appeared above the lake.
In the small lake, sea-blue flames connected in a continuous sheet, rising up and filling the surroundings with intense heat.
Leo took a deep breath, a look of resolve flashing in his eyes.
Celestial Artifacts are rare opportunities that come with great fortune but also contain inherent risks.
When Leo refined the Nine-Petal Ice-Soul Lotus back then, it was also a life-and-death situation.
With determination in his heart, Leo activated the Nine-Petal Ice-Soul Lotus within him. An ice armor automatically appeared on his body.
Then, outside the ice armor, an Arctic Shield formed, protecting Leo entirely within it.
With double protection in place, Leo’s figure turned into an icy white stream of light and shot towards the lake filled with sea-blue flames.
As his body plunged into the lake, terrifying heat penetrated through the shield.
The sea-blue flames completely enveloped Leo.
A large amount of white steam rose from the shield and was burned into nothingness by the intense heat of the flames.
Feeling such terrifying heat firsthand, Leo’s gaze sharpened. The Nine-Petal Ice-Soul Lotus in his dantian spun even faster.
Extreme cold energy spread out, replenishing the Arctic Shield’s consumption.
Leo’s figure moved swiftly within the sea-blue fire.
In Leo’s vision, there were only sea-blue flames. These flames were so dense that even divine sense couldn’t penetrate them.
Where could the source of Nether Flame be?
Leo swam in one direction based on intuition and feeling alone.
After searching for nearly half an hour, Leo’s face began to pale. This indicated that his spiritual power was nearly exhausted.
Continuously activating Nine-Petal Ice-Soul Lotus consumed a tremendous amount of spiritual power.
After persisting for a while longer, Leo had no choice but to stop and swim towards the surface of the fire lake.
Emerging from the fire lake, Leo appeared in mid-air. The terrifying heat surrounding him instantly disappeared.
Leo took a deep breath of cool air from heaven and earth. His pale complexion improved slightly.
Searching within the fire lake not only consumed a lot of his spiritual power but also drained his mental strength significantly.
Leo was not one to give up easily. He decided to recover slightly before continuing his search.
With a flash of his figure, Leo returned to the central stone platform to restore his depleted spiritual power.
Before long, Leo’s spiritual power returned to its peak state.
Immediately after, Leo flashed back to where he had emerged earlier. His figure once again turned into an icy white stream of light and entered the fire lake.
The fire lake formed by Nether Flame blocked divine sense completely. There was no way to detect Nether Flame’s source using divine sense alone.
Leo could only search blindly like finding a needle in a haystack without any better method available.
Within the fire lake, Leo’s eyes burned with determination as he searched for traces of Nether Flame without missing any spots.
Half an hour later, when his spiritual power was exhausted again, he had to emerge from the fire lake once more.
Then came restoring spiritual power before diving back into the fire lake again.
This cycle continued repeatedly: going in and coming out over and over…
Such an endeavor tested patience and mental fortitude greatly. If it were someone with less determination than Leo’s strong willpower would have driven them mad long ago.
Leo searched tirelessly day and night for three days straight until dawn on day four arrived.
The morning sunlight fell on Leo’s persistent face as he continued searching diligently within two-thirds of this small lake area already covered while one-third remained unexplored.
After recovering once again, Leo plunged into the sea of fire once more.
He had to find the origin of the Nether Flame in the shortest possible time because refining the origin of the Nether Flame would also take quite a while.