CHAPTER 956: WAYS TO EXTRACT THE BLOOD PARASITE

After leaving Lyra’s office, Max returned straight to his quarters. The moment the door closed behind him, a faint smirk tugged at the corner of his lips as he stretched his arms.

"It’s time for a bath. I haven’t bathed in three months," he muttered to himself, heading directly for the bathroom without another thought. Steam soon filled the room, and for the first time in what felt like an eternity, the grime and exhaustion of countless battles began to melt away.

A few hours later, Max emerged, sitting comfortably on his bed with a feeling of lightness he hadn’t experienced in weeks. The fatigue in his muscles had eased, and the sharp scent of clean skin replaced the lingering scent of blood and dust.

Beside him, on a sturdy table, lay a spread of treasures and herbs—gleaming, glowing, and shimmering faintly with natural energy. Each item radiated value, and their combined aura made the air itself feel heavy. These were the spoils he had risked life and limb to collect from the secret domain.

"They should sell for a hefty amount of money," he mused with a satisfied smile, running his fingers over the surface of a particularly rare spirit flower.

Every piece here had been obtained through hardship—fighting deadly beasts, outsmarting rival geniuses, and barely escaping death on more than one occasion. Now, at last, came the reward.

But his smile faded when a darker memory crept back into his mind—the blood parasite hidden within his body, and the sinister deal struck with the being imprisoned inside the Nether Stone. Even now, recalling the chilling voice that had resonated from that cursed object made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

"Ten years to step into the Divine Rank... and to gather the treasures he demanded," Max muttered under his breath, a deep frown forming between his brows. The problem wasn’t just the time limit—it was the list itself. Most of those treasures had either vanished from the world entirely or were so rare that they hadn’t been seen in the Middle Domain for centuries.

"Phoenix Blood Crystal... Dragon Blood Stone... Sun Essence Stone... and lastly... Six Yin True Water..." he spoke the names one by one, the weight in his tone reflecting the magnitude of the task ahead. Each of these was a treasure of legend, so valuable that even Divine Rank experts would shed rivers of blood to claim them. In the Middle Domain, they were as good as myths—spoken of in hushed tones, but never seen.

His gaze narrowed as he leaned back slightly. "Blob," he called inwardly, his voice calm but tinged with expectation, "have you heard of these things?"

Just then, Blob’s small, bobbly figure materialized in front of Max, its form glowing faintly in the dim light of the room. "Phoenix Blood Crystal," Blob began in a slow, steady tone, "is formed only from the essence of a highly concentrated blood of Phoenix. Such a phoenix doesn’t just have to exist—it has to be injured or slain in a way that causes its essence to condense over centuries."

"Similarly, the Dragon Blood Stone is born from a place where True Dragon’s blood has seeped deeply into the earth, saturating it with such purity and power that it crystallizes over the ages. The Sun Essence Stone is no easier—it forms only in lands where extreme sun essence is ever-present, enough to scorch even the soul."

"As for the Six Yin True Water, it requires an environment so dense with yin energy that it warps the very laws of nature. You’ve already walked through places rich in yin before, yet you never encountered it—that alone should tell you how impossibly rare it is."

Blob’s gaze hardened. "Phoenixes and True Dragons cannot be found anywhere in the Middle Domain. They’ve long since vanished, their territories destroyed or hidden in higher realms. As for sun essence... you’d be better off hoping to stumble into the heart of a dying sun itself. If it were ten thousand years ago, perhaps there might have been hope, but now? In the Middle Domain as it is... you won’t find a single one of these treasures."

Max’s expression grew grim, his earlier spark of determination dimming into a cold, calculating solemnity. "Alright," he said finally, "forget about finding those treasures for now. You told me before that you’d teach me a method to extract the blood parasite from my body. Tell me how to do it."

Blob tilted its round head slightly, its tone shifting to a more cautious one. "Don’t take my words for granted, Max. The use of blood parasites to enslave others isn’t a new evil—it existed even in my master’s era. We encountered many who were bound by them... and only a rare few who survived the extraction. The process is excruciating, the risk of failure almost absolute, but..." Blob’s voice dropped into a deeper note, "...it isn’t entirely impossible."

Max’s eyes lit up instantly, leaning forward. "That means there is a way to remove it, right? Tell me. Quickly." His voice carried the weight of both urgency and hope, as if the answer could not come soon enough.

Blob’s voice was calm but carried a weight that made Max’s brow furrow with every word. "There are two methods I know of that might—and I stress, might—allow you to extract the blood parasite from your body. The first is to expose yourself to extremes... and I mean true extremes. Either extreme cold or extreme heat, nothing in between. Blood parasites survive by thriving in the warmth and flow of your blood. But if your body is subjected to a cold so intense that even your blood freezes solid, the parasite will be forced to abandon your body. Without liquid blood to sustain it, it cannot survive."

"Another reason is that blood parasites simply cannot endure such freezing environments—it’s in their nature to perish when the very life fluid they inhabit becomes ice. But..." Blob’s tone hardened, "you must ensure the cold is absolute, far beyond what ordinary humans or even high-level cultivators can tolerate. Anything less, and you’ll only weaken yourself without affecting it."

He paused, letting the weight of his words sink in before continuing. "Similarly, you could use extreme heat. I’m not talking about a hot spring or a desert sun—I mean heat so vicious that it scorches every inch of your flesh, where your blood literally begins to boil. In such conditions, the parasite would have no choice but to escape. Blood parasites cannot endure overly hot blood, nor can they survive in temperatures that burn the very vessels they cling to."