Cultivation of immortality begins with an eighty-year-old eunuch.

Chen Fan did not respond.

Rosa didn't mind and continued, "According to the rules, you should receive the reward for the second level. However, the reward for this level is different from the first. The killing intent you comprehended is the greatest reward itself. I have merely opened the door to the Sea of ​​Slaughter for you. Whether you can enter or come out depends entirely on your own comprehension. If you can come out, that's enough."

Chen Fan nodded without saying anything more.

He knew Rosa was telling the truth.

The essence of artistic conception cannot be bestowed by external things. To comprehend it is one's own skill.

If you can't understand it, no amount of treasures from others will help.

"Next, we'll face the final challenge."

Rosa's voice suddenly turned somber, carrying an unprecedented gravity.

"The third challenge: The Demon's Heart."

Chen Fan raised his head, his gaze falling on Rosa's blurry face.

"This level is completely different from the previous two," Rosa said slowly.

"The Formation Trial tests your deductive reasoning skills, while the Comprehension Trial tests your understanding of the Great Dao. These two trials are perilous, but as long as your foundation is solid and your comprehension is sufficient, there's always a way to overcome them. But the Demon Heart Trial is different… This trial tests your identification with the Ancient Demon Clan. I won't hide it from you. The difficulty of this Demon Heart Trial is actually unfair to you outsiders. For ordinary Ancient Demons, this trial is the easiest, but for you… it's worlds apart!"

Chen Fan nodded after listening.

Rosa, with his hands behind his back, sighed and then spoke:

"If you want to pass this test, you must be prepared for the worst. Once you step in, there is no turning back. Either you pass and become the true successor of my ancient demon clan, or you fail and disappear from this world forever."

Chen Fan remained silent.

He lowered his eyes, seemingly deep in thought.

Rosa stood with his hands behind his back in the starry sky, waiting quietly.

After an unknown amount of time, Chen Fan slowly raised his head.

"senior."

"Please proceed to the third level."

Rosa nodded slightly and raised her hand to make a light sweeping motion in the air.

This time, there was neither the rage of the Sea of ​​Formations nor the bloodshed of the Sea of ​​Slaughter in the starry sky.

Chen Fan felt the light and shadows before his eyes suddenly change, and the space around him seemed to be crushed by an invisible hand. His consciousness reassembled after a brief blank.

When Chen Fan opened his eyes again, he found himself lying next to a murky ditch.

The sky was a grayish-yellow, as if shrouded in a layer of sand that would never dissipate. The air was dry and scorching hot, and every breath carried a pungent, sulfurous odor.

The distant mountains were barren and devoid of any vegetation, their surfaces a dark reddish-brown as if scorched by intense heat, resembling massive piles of slag.

Chen Fan slowly sat up and looked down at his hands.

These are rough, thick hands covered with fine scales.

His fingers were shorter and thicker than those of humans, with black and hard nails, like five miniature blades. He rolled up his sleeve, revealing that his arm was also covered with a layer of dark gray scales, with indelible black grime embedded in the gaps between the scales.

He touched his face, noting his high brow bones, deep-set eyes, and two curved horns extending backward from the sides of his forehead.

This is the body of an ancient demon.

Chen Fan was stunned for a moment, then used his divine sense to examine the body.

Compared to his original body, which had been tempered by the fusion of immortal and demonic power, this ancient demonic body was pitifully weak.

What flowed through his body was not spiritual power, but a scorching and violent bloodline power that rampaged through his thick meridians without any order.

Moreover, the physical body's level is roughly equivalent to the late Foundation Establishment stage of the human race, which is probably not even considered the lowest-ranking warrior among the ancient demon race.

"The third challenge, the Demon Heart," Chen Fan murmured to himself, recalling Luo Sha's words.

He thought this test was to assess his identification with the ancient demon race, requiring him to live as an ancient demon, to feel, to experience, and to gradually see himself as one of the ancient demons.

As I was lost in thought, a piercing scream came from not far away.

Chen Fan looked in the direction of the sound.

At the end of the ditch lay a wide expanse of yellow earth, its surface worn smooth and shiny by countless footsteps, clearly a long-used plaza. In the center of the plaza stood a dozen thick stone pillars, their shafts covered with dried, dark marks. Seven or eight tall, ancient demons surrounded the pillars, their faces bearing smiles that Chen Fan could not yet accurately decipher.

People were tied to the stone pillar.

They were not ancient demons, but human cultivators.

Chen Fan could clearly sense the spiritual energy fluctuations emanating from them; though weak, it was undoubtedly pure. There were three people in total, two men and one woman, all with cultivation levels around the Foundation Establishment stage. Their robes were torn, and their bodies were covered in bloodstains, clearly indicating that they had suffered considerable torture before being tied to the stone pillars.

A giant ancient demon, nearly ten feet tall, stepped out from the crowd. His bare upper body was muscular and gnarled like the roots of an old tree. The scales on his chest were dark black, several times larger than the fine scales on his arms, and gleamed with a cold, eerie light in the grayish-yellow sunlight.

He carried a rough bone knife in his hand, with several fangs of unknown monsters embedded in the back of the blade.

The burly man walked up to a human male cultivator, grinned, and said something. The distance was too great for Chen Fan to hear clearly; he only saw the cultivator suddenly raise his head and open his mouth as if to say something.

But the big man didn't give him a chance to speak.

The bone knife fell.

The male cultivator's right arm was severed at the shoulder, and blood gushed out, staining half of the stone pillar red. Before he could even let out a scream, the excruciating pain choked him in his throat, and he convulsed a few times before losing consciousness.

The ancient demons watching burst into rough laughter. A burly man patted the swordsman on the shoulder and said something, seemingly praising the angle of the strike.

Chen Fan stood by the ditch, watching quietly.

His face was expressionless.

In those ten years of carnage, he had witnessed far more horrific scenes than this: the tearing of the dead, the corrosive power of resentment, repeatedly shattering mangled bodies.

In terms of gore, this severed arm is nothing compared to the bloodshed.

However, there is a fundamental difference between the two.

The undead in the Killing Grounds are inanimate objects; they have no pain, no fear, and no instinct for survival.

The human cultivators bound to the stone pillars before us were living, breathing beings. They would bleed, scream, and desperately twist their bodies in their final moments, trying to live even a single breath longer.

Chen Fan watched as the male cultivator, whose arm had been severed, was unconscious while another ancient demon grabbed his skull and twisted his head off his neck like breaking off a melon.

The gushing blood splattered all over the ancient demon, but the demon didn't care. Instead, it threw its head back and laughed a few times before casually tossing its head into the pile of bones next to it.

Chen Fan's right hand twitched slightly.

It was an extremely subtle movement, like an instinctive urge to grip the hilt of a sword.

However, his right hand grasped nothing.

He wasn't by his side during the National Day holiday.

His current identity is no longer that of a Nascent Soul sword cultivator who roamed Tiannan Star, but rather a low-ranking member of the Ancient Demon Clan with a weak bloodline.

Chen Fan was not qualified to draw his sword on the tribe's execution ground, nor was he capable of stopping it.

So his right hand fell down again.