Despite everything happening, Cao Yun was also trying to be careful about how much time had passed. Indeed, it was possible for another group from the 5th Imperial Brocade Guards to arrive in order to support the Orchid's Ashes. Unfortunately, his fight had not been discreet at all. As it turned out, he had probably fought the worst possible opponent in the entire 5th Imperial Brocade Guards. Although she wasn't per se the strongest cultivator or even the best martial artist, her Solar-Orchid Flame had been a huge thorn in Cao Yun's side. Without it, his Rune of Fire would have never been suppressed and he could have used his Black Heart Flame as much as he wanted. In such an environment, so rich in Death Energy and Ghost Energy, this evil flame was clearly his best weapon.

Anyway, Cao Yun was too exhausted and injured to absolutely trust his senses. Although he had been using array formations to track down the movements of the 5th Imperial Brocade Guards, he couldn't be sure that they were accurate right now. He might miss something and reinforcements could arrive at any moment. Thus, Cao Yun had estimated how long it would take the closest group to arrive. In the worst-case scenario, he had around an hour, no more. Hopefully, it would be enough for him to get this Solar-Orchid Flame under control. After that, he had already prepared several places he could hide. Indeed, Cao Yun was not suicidal, despite what had just happened and was still happening. During the entire fight, he had always kept in mind how he could escape. But as long as he had an ounce of belief in his victory, he would not give up.

With his superficial, but still good, understanding of 'Garden of the Nine-Nine Carnations', Cao Yun was not able to suppress the seed. However, he might do what Yan Huoling herself had done. Since controlling the fire was almost impossible, he could try to channel it in order to exhaust it in another direction. In fact, with such a method, if he decided to discard the seed in order to fly away, he might even be able to focus the explosion in a specific direction so that he would reduce the blow to him.

For Cao Yun's plan to work, he had to gain just enough control over the seed so that it wouldn't literally engulf him in flames. Right now, if he opened even a small path for the flames, they would obviously spread all around and even travel back in his direction to consume him. Many flowers made of Black Heart Flame were now covering the entirety of Cao Yun's charred arm. In fact, it was impossible to even see his arm. Circulating his blood cultivation as much as he could, Cao Yun was feeding those flowers with his own Golden Blood. Slowly, black petals from the flowers began to flutter in the air. Each flower had nine concentric circles of petals. Each circle had exactly nine petals. Cao Yun knew that if he was able to understand 'Garden of the Nine-Nine Carnations' better, each circle and each petal would have different properties.

Honestly, Cao Yun didn't care at all about this technique. It was good but it wasn't good enough for him to really study it seriously. Right now, its only advantage was that the seed had grown accustomed to this technique since Yan Huoling had been using it for years. Among all the books and manuals read by Cao Yun, it was a good and advanced technique. If Cao Yun had discovered it earlier, he would have pursued it. However, he simply had better techniques at his disposal now. That being said, finding new techniques and cultivation methods he had never seen before was always pleasant. It was such a pity he had no time to be pleased at the moment.

Finally, the black petals formed a large ball all around the seed. To be precise, they were landing on the sphere created by Cao Yun's spiritual senses in order to contain the seed. As they merged with this layer of spiritual senses, Cao Yun really felt a form of relief. It wasn't extraordinary, but any kind of relief was great at the moment. Even the heat and the flames going up his arm were slightly diminishing.

Obviously, Cao Yun wouldn't act without Dian Mo's support. The part of his soul that was still within Yan Huoling was acting to help Dian Mo. Bit by bit, the shadow from the Palace of Supreme Wisdom was spreading. Unlike Cao Yun, Dian Mo had no kind of relief from the seed apart from the young man's support. After all, they were inside the seed. In fact, Cao Yun's actions could actually have made things worse within, as they could have condensed the heat and flames of the seed even more. Thankfully, it never happened. Otherwise, the young man might have been forced to find another way.

Without speaking, Cao Yun sent his ideas directly into Dian Mo's mind. The spirit had to admit that it was the best plan they had at the moment. However, he asked for some time to try and get more information. The more he knew about the flame, the likelier their chances of success would be. Unfortunately, Dian Mo couldn't just choose the memories he absorbed. That being said, he could choose which seals to get rid of. Obviously, stronger seals were protecting more important information. Some information was related to the Hongchen Kingdom and was currently useless, but some information would be related to the current crisis they were facing. As such, Dian Mo tried his chances several times.

The Palace of Supreme Wisdom was able to absorb a few strands of Yan Huoling's soul alongside some of her memories. Within them, he found things that would greatly interest Cao Yun, but not right now. At the very last moment, when he was about to ask Cao Yun to attempt his plan, he found one crucial memory and sent it directly to Cao Yun. It was the memory of the day she had first trained with the seed.

Yan Huoling had received the seed directly from Emperor Weide because, not only was she the cultivator with the best control over fire, but her constitution and her cultivation methods were also best suited for this particular flame. Emperor Weide, and his predecessors, had secretly given this flame to many cultivators throughout the ages. What Cao Yun and Dian Mo discovered was that it wasn't really Emperor Nuwa's Solar-Orchid Flame.

Before ascending, Emperor Nuwa had left a tiny spark from her Solar-Orchid Flame. Indeed, her Solar-Orchid Flame wasn't a mere seed. Although no one knew how far it had progressed, it was obvious that her understanding of the Dao of Fire was extremely advanced compared to everyone currently in the Hongchen Kingdom. In fact, Emperor Nuwa could control or snuff out this seed with a single thought, only using her understanding of the Dao of Fire. Since no one could control her actual Solar-Orchid Flame, she only left one spark behind for her successors.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

The various emperors after her cultivated this seed. Many were able to make it fully bloom and develop into a Solar-Orchid Flame almost identical to Emperor Nuwa's. Each time, those who took the seed would leave behind a new spark so that a seed always remained. Unfortunately, the Forsaken Dao Era arrived. Cultivators who could actually cultivate this seed became so scarce that no one was able to make it bloom. The last spark stayed a few centuries without even being cultivated into a seed. It took generations for a new seed to be formed from the previous spark. Yan Huoling was the eleventh cultivator to obtain the seed. It might need a few more cultivators for the seed itself to finally start to bloom.

All that wasn't necessarily useful right now. But the memories of Yan Huoling working on the seed the very first time were. Cao Yun immersed himself in those memories. He could quite literally feel the exact same sensations as he was reliving this day. With his mind cultivation, he could live an entire day in a matter of minutes. Considering that he wasn't sure how long he had, it was good. And he couldn't just go to a nearby hiding place because he couldn't get this seed under control, so it would betray his presence.

Yan Huoling had been completely unable to fully control the seed. Instead, she had found ways around it. For example, she had found out how to channel its destructive power in specific directions. Although it wasn't perfect, it might serve Cao Yun. At the end of the day, the young man saw what would absolutely serve him. He saw the seals used by Yan Huoling to contain the seed. Those were the seals taught by Emperor Nuwa when she left the very first spark of the Solar-Orchid Flame. However, it only worked on a seed that was sufficiently calm. In other words, Cao Yun had to exhaust the flames a little before even attempting to subdue the seed.

No matter what was required, Cao Yun didn't waste any time and began to create the seals right away. In his sea of consciousness, a field of black flowers had appeared all over his Nine Soul Peaks. Like what had happened in the material world, thousands of petals had covered the orchid that was still trying to bloom. In fact, they had also partially covered the large frame of Axiu Qian. All those petals were helping to prevent the flower from blooming while also supporting Axiu Qian. Now, many fiery runes began to appear in the infinite water. Those were the seals of Emperor Nuwa. Thankfully, Cao Yun had trained with Dian Mo and was still able to communicate with him. Although the spirit was a bit busy, he was helping Cao Yun with those seals a little.

Finally, the young man decided to try weakening the seed. He focused everything on controlling the potential backlash and then slowly made an opening within the encasement of the seed. No matter how careful he tried to be, a terrifying geyser of fire erupted from the small opening. It almost completely blew open Cao Yun's spiritual senses. Without the black petals all around it, the flames would have destroyed it and Cao Yun would have been faced with an inferno within his own flesh. Some petals started to slowly turn to dust without even burning, the heat itself near the focal point of the flames was enough to annihilate them. If Cao Yun had been near it, he would have lost his limb or maybe even his life.

The flames spread far in the direction Cao Yun had chosen. If the other cultivators had not found Cao Yun during the fight, they had now. It was impossible that any Spirit Warrior could have missed that. Even mere mortals couldn't miss it. Of course, Cao Yun had aimed the flames in the direction that would attract the least attention since he had a rough idea of where the various groups considering he had planted decoys himself. However, the least apparent didn't mean that it wasn't apparent. When there was no good answer, the best answer was necessarily bad...

As the flames were spreading outside, the pressure and the heat around the seed started to slowly decrease. This time, Dian Mo felt a clear difference. As the flames were erupting out of the encasement, the Palace of Supreme Wisdom was devouring more and more of Yan Huoling's soul. Soon, Dian Mo would have absolutely everything and Yan Huoling could do nothing to prevent it. Now that he had understood the seals used in her sea of consciousness, he was able to unravel them. The only problem was really just time.

At last, Cao Yun felt that the Solar-Orchid Flame was getting weaker and weaker. It had purged a large part of the energy provided by the sacrifices of the cultivators and the battle formation of the Orchid's Ashes.

After enough time had passed, the young man sent several seals within the breached encasement. One by one they entered the seed. Cao Yun was extremely careful. But with each seal, the seed calmed down even more. Honestly, it was hard to tell if it was because it was losing so much energy so fast or if it was the effect of the seals. Anyway, Cao Yun was encouraged by the success and kept on going and going.

Within the seed itself, Dian Mo saw those seals appear. They were echoing with seals left by Yan Huoling herself. Before they could clash, though, Dian Mo erased the previous seals. Since he was communicating with Cao Yun, he knew which seal the young man was sending next and simply focused on destroying this one first. One by one, Cao Yun and Dian Mo were replacing the seals in the seed.

Suddenly, a huge crack appeared and Yan Huoling's sea of consciousness instantly collapsed. Dian Mo did not hesitate and devoured everything. Right after that, he went back into Cao Yun's sea of consciousness. They would have some time to analyze everything later. For now, Dian Mo supported his friend in order to tame the seed. With so little time, Cao Yun had no illusions about completely controlling the seed. To be fair, even Yan Huoling had never been able to fully control it either. But Cao Yun didn't hope to achieve even a tenth of Yan Huoling's control over it right now. For the moment, he was just trying to subdue it long enough so he could take it away without being burned or discovered by other cultivators.

When the seed finally calmed down enough, Cao Yun took out a small metallic box from his spatial ring. There were several array formations engraved in it that Cao Yun had set up himself. Such a box was meant to hold precious objects while preventing anything from slipping out. It had been designed to hold pills or even demonic cores, but it would be perfect to contain this seed. And this was exactly what Cao Yun did. The seed entered the box that immediately closed. Thankfully, the seed was calm enough that it didn't even melt the box.

With all his senses, Cao Yun himself was unable to feel the presence of the seed even when he knew what it was. Thus, he was convinced that no one would be able to either. A bit worried about it, he didn't put the box in his spatial ring. Instead, he flew away with the box in a new robe he had taken out too.

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