Aspiring to the Immortal Path

After finding a place to sit, Tang Jie merged himself back together. Because of the avatar, his body shrank, but it wasn't as bad as before, which was a sign that he had somewhat adapted to the environment.

He then took out the Mother Cloud combat puppet.

After successive upgrades, this puppet was able to fight against Violet Palace experts, so it should have been a capable helper for Tang Jie. Alas, Tang Jie's opponents this time were too strong, and a Violet Palace helper wasn't too useful.

But with the Five Elements treatise, Tang Jie saw an opportunity.

All the world belonged to the Five Elements; all things comprised them.

In the Great Dao pairing of Yin Yang and Five Elements, Yin Yang referred to the negative and positive aspects of all things while Five Elements referred to the basic elements that composed them.

Tang Jie's Infinite Palace was based on this principle of the Five Elements, drawing on the basic elements to create the palace.

But using only the basic elements was a little too… basic. True mastery would be to use the Essences of the Five Elements.

In other words, Metal Essence, Water Essence, and so on.

The Mother Cloud Combat Puppet was made from Mother Cloud Metal Essence, the toughest substance in the world. The Sovereign Blade was made from a variant of Metal Essence, possessing not just toughness, but also the sharpness of a weapon and the ability to transform of a spell art, which made it even better than Metal Essence.

In short, Metal Essence was the physical foundation of the combat puppet while the Soul Refining Pearl was its mental foundation.

To make it stronger, Metal Essence alone wasn't enough.

With this Five Elements treatise, Tang Jie had deepened his understanding of this Dao, with the biggest breakthrough being that he could now refine the other four essences.

Tang Jie took out two balls of flame.

The Pale Cloud Flame and the Deicide Flame.

Holding these two flames, he began to form hand signs, and various Dao Runes belonging to the Fire Dao began to appear in the room. Gradually, influenced by the Dao Runes, the two flames began to merge together and condense.

Forming hand signs and manifesting Dao Runes seemed simple, but Tang Jie's forehead quickly became caked with sweat. Even killing two Earth Immortals in a row hadn't been this tiring. Refining Fire Essence wasn't easy, at least not as easy as Metal Essence had been with the Weapon Mantra.

This was primarily because Tang Jie had just learned this. As time passed, he would slowly grow more proficient.

As the ball of flame condensed, there was a burst of sparks, and the flame ultimately transformed into a fist-sized flame flower.

This was the Fire Essence that Tang Jie had refined, also known as the Fire of Primal Chaos, the Flame of Origin. By no means should one underestimate it because of its size. It shared the properties of both the Deicide Flame and the Pale Cloud Flame, and it would only grow stronger as one added more exotic flames to it.

Of course, this Origin Flame was far inferior to the Flame Celestial Sovereign's Origin Flame. That man had entered the Dao of Fire, so his Origin Flame was thousands of times stronger.

For Tang Jie's purposes, however, this was enough.

He threw the Origin Flame over to the combat puppet. At the same time, a Dao Rune manifested, attaching to the puppet and guiding the flame into the body.

Tang Jie then called out, "Little Three."

A Nether Passage appeared, and a small ghost appeared next to Tang Jie's side.

Tang Jie held out his hand. "Give me the Profound Heavy Water."

Little Three passed a water ball to Tang Jie—the Profound Heavy Water that Tang Jie had given to protect him. This object could hold seas of water, and it even had the Yellow Springs of the Nether Domain.

Tang Jie began to refine the Water Essence.

Using the same method, he quickly obtained a giant drop of water with a yellow sheen. There was a great turbulence within, as if countless waters flowed within it.

Tang Jie also put this drop of water in the puppet's body.

All that was left was the Wood Element and Earth Element.

Tang Jie had obtained some Wood Element and Earth Element treasures in the past, but he had fed the Wood Element treasures to Yiyi and used the Earth Element ones for formations. Thus, he had nothing appropriate to refine into their respective essences.

Fortunately, what he lacked, the Mustard Seed Bag possessed.

A ten-thousand-year-old pine tree, a handful of sand from a stellar river, a frosty purple willow tree, and a piece of golden night jade.

These weren't as rare as the Deicide Flame or waters of the Nether Domain, but they were rare enough to just barely meet the grade for refining the Earth and Wood Essences.

Tang Jie also threw in the other materials in the bag, finally refining the two essences and placing them in the combat puppet's body.

Tang Jie began to thrust out his palms, Dao Runes dancing and formation lines flashing all across the puppet's body, and even its form began to gradually change.

Tang Jie called out, "Forge the body with Metal, making it your bones. Let the Earth be your meridians, traveling along the formation lines. The Wood shall be life, forming the organs. Water shall be your blood, a medium for energy. Fire will be your source, enhancing your power. The Soul Refining Pearl shall be your soul, casting spell arts and controlling attacks so that you know when to advance or retreat, attack or defend. I name you the Everlasting Combat Puppet!"

With the last word, Tang Jie slapped his hand down, and all of the formation lines on the puppet lit up in unison, its aura erupting. Its materials had limited it to Infant Tending, but now, its power surged, breaking into Deification and soaring straight past it, all the way to Soul Projection. But this still wasn't the end, and it went all the way to the peak of Soul Projection before finally stopping. This speed of advancement was simply unheard of.

Even then, Tang Jie wasn't satisfied, frowning. "Is it because of your soul that you're still unable to break into Immortal Platform?"

The puppet body created through the five essences had actually already reached the Immortal Body level, perhaps even surpassing it. But Earth Immortals were powerful not just because of their Immortal Body, but also because of their Divine Soul. It was precisely because their soul had been deified that they could achieve Immortality.

And the Mother Cloud combat puppet was far from reaching this level.

While he had long guessed this outcome, he still couldn't help but feel a tinge of disappointment.

A Soul Projection puppet might as well not exist. After all, not everyone could be like Tang Jie and fight with Immortals while still at Soul Projection. Of course, as the puppet was perhaps even tougher than an Earth Immortal, fighting a battle was still possible. However, while Earth Immortals could afford to die, the combat puppet couldn't. Without some overwhelming advantage against Earth Immortals and without their ability to be constantly reborn, the puppet could only offer limited aid.

At this moment, a crimson light erupted from the puppet's eyes, and its aura began to soar once more.

Tang Jie was startled, and then he realized what was going on.

Unlike other combat puppets, the Mother Cloud combat puppet had a life force.

It was the ghost guard, the Soul Refining Pearl.

This life existed within the puppet, and had been accumulating energy all this time. It was now unleashing this energy, causing the puppet's energy to soar toward the Immortal Platform Realm.

Was it really about to reach the Immortal level? Tang Jie could barely suppress his excitement.

But at this moment, its progress came to a halt.

What was going on here?

Tang Jie carefully examined it and found that the Soul Refining Pearl was completely drained of energy.

"Ah, it's still not enough," Tang Jie said in realization.

Though the pearl had been storing up energy for several hundred years, this still wasn't enough compared to the humongous quantities of energy required for Immortal Platform.

This put the combat puppet in a state like the Vermillion Bird: half-step Immortal Platform. The only difference was that the Vermillion Bird's body was slightly weaker while her soul was slightly stronger, with the puppet being the exact opposite.

Doing the math, two half-step Earth Immortals would be enough to hold out against… half an Immortal Platform expert.

Yes, two half-step Immortal Platform experts multiplied by two would be enough to fight with a single Earth Immortal.

But if combined with Tang Jie's formation and the help of Xu Miaoran and Yiyi, it was doable.

"This should increase my chances even more," Tang Jie muttered.