Mysterious Source

"Old Bell is a coward, and a beautiful one at that! After all, he's an ancient bell thousands of years old, he's seen it all!"

Xu Ying secretly praised the Great Bell's magnanimity, thinking, The Female Ghost knows the owner of Qin Yan Cave? Then she's not here to kill us, but to mourn an old friend.

He blinked, "What did the Female Ghost mean when she said this was a place of ascension? And what are the Cangwu Abyss and the Ageless Immortal?"

From within the palace, the maiden's voice drifted, ethereal, as if from the clouds, "Are you alive or dead? If you are alive, where did you go? I searched all over Divine Land, why can't I find any trace of you?"

She stepped into the black coffin, the lid closed, and with a whistling of chains, it flew out of the White Jade Palace towards the outside of Qin Yan Cave, leaving only a mournful voice echoing in the cave dwelling.

"Did you ascend, or did you pass away? Why, after waking up three thousand years later, am I the only one left in the world..."

Xu Ying breathed a sigh of relief. If the maiden in the coffin had been a little more observant, she might have discovered the Great Bell submerged at the bottom of the water, and perhaps in her rage, she would have annihilated both King Xu and King Niu.

Suddenly, Xu Ying remembered the Great Bell and hurriedly tried to retrieve it.

However, the Great Bell seemed to have lost its temper, sinking to the bottom of the water with a plop, refusing to come up no matter what.

Xu Ying tried to retrieve it several times but failed, growing annoyed. He angrily declared, "If you've got the guts, go fight the Female Ghost. What kind of skill is it to bully me?"

The Great Bell was indeed cowardly and didn't dare to fight the maiden in the coffin. It flew out of the water and doused Xu Ying's head with the water inside, splashing with a "hua la" sound.

This action seemed to exhaust all its accumulated strength, and it fell back down, clanging along behind Xu Ying.

Xu Ying didn't bother with it, activating his Blood Essence to dry his clothes, and followed Yuan Qi towards the White Jade Palace.

In front of the palace, Xu Ying stopped and looked up.

He saw characters carved on the lintel of the White Jade Palace's gate. They were unlike any script in the world today, looking like traces of tadpoles crawling in mud, or like the tracks of bird claws in the snow after a snowfall.

Yuan Qi said, "Don't look. My ancestors for three generations couldn't recognize these characters on the lintel, and I don't know what this place is called."

Xu Ying's expression turned strange, "It says 'Ni Wan Palace Cave Heaven' here."

Yuan Qi looked confused, "You recognize this script?"

He was utterly astonished. The Old Niu Family, spanning three generations, were well-read and erudite scholars, yet they had never deciphered the characters on the lintel. Xu Ying was just a commoner, how could he recognize such script?

Xu Ying's gaze was peculiar, "I've never seen this script before, but strangely, after seeing these characters, I naturally knew what they meant and how to read them. It's like..."

He frowned, as if these characters were already etched into his mind!

But he racked his brain, he had definitely never learned or seen this script before!

Yuan Qi was deeply puzzled. Recalling Xu Ying's various strange behaviors, he asked, "A Ying, have you ever suffered from amnesia?"

Xu Ying laughed out loud, "I absolutely haven't suffered from amnesia! How could I possibly have amnesia? I've been intelligent since childhood, my memory is incredibly clear, I can even recall when I was ten months old!"

His heart ached faintly. He could remember every detail of the fire at Xu Family Village, even the scene of his parents perishing in the flames!

He wanted to forget this memory, but he couldn't.

Yuan Qi blinked, thinking, You even got your parents' names wrong, so your memory isn't reliable at all. Did someone damage his brain before?

The Great Bell rolled on the ground, clearly also harboring doubts about Xu Ying's memory.

Xu Ying examined the strange characters on the lintel, and a thought suddenly struck him. He took out the Ni Wan Hidden Scenery Qi Refining Method, then looked up at the characters on the lintel again, and wondered, "Ni Wan Palace Cave Heaven, and the Ni Wan Hidden Scenery Qi Refining Method, both have 'Ni Wan' in them. Is there a connection?"

The Ni Wan Secret Treasury was one of the Six Secrets of the Human Body. Opening any one of these secrets could turn one into a Nu Master. And the secret treasury controlled by the Zhou family, a Nu Master lineage, was the Ni Wan!

The Ni Wan Secret Treasury held an irresistible allure for Xu Ying, almost becoming his obsession!

Yuan Qi, leading the way, beckoned him into the palace. Xu Ying put away his scattered thoughts and entered. Inside the White Jade Palace, bookshelves were everywhere, with rows of books neatly arranged.

Yuan Qi said he was from a scholarly family with a deep heritage, and it was true!

"My family, spanning three generations, has lived here for over three hundred years, collecting countless ancient books," Yuan Qi said proudly. "All the ancient books that can be found in Lingling are here, and I've read them all."

Xu Ying felt both admiration and a sense of shame. Compared to this Snake Demon, he was truly unlearned.

Suddenly, Yuan Qi's expression changed drastically, and he exclaimed, "A Ying, I suddenly feel Blood Essence transforming into the power of transformation within me. I'm probably about to transform into human form!"

His vision was becoming blurry, and a layer of dead skin had appeared on his pupils, making his eyes look white. This was a sign of metamorphosis.

Yuan Qi hurriedly ducked into a room within the White Jade Palace and called out, "While I'm in seclusion, don't wander around. Mount Wu Wang has become Mount Wu Wang, and I'm not familiar with the geography of the current Mount Wu Wang!"

He had to find a safe place to shed his old skin before he could transform. If he delayed, he might suffocate inside his old skin!

Xu Ying approached the jade mural and looked up.

The woman in the coffin had stood in this very spot, gazing at the jade mural to mourn her old friend.

The jade mural depicted a magnificent mountain, steep and towering, reaching into the clouds, as if it towered above all other mountains in the world!

As a Snake Catcher, Xu Ying was constantly on the move, catching strange snakes. He had seen countless mountains, but the one depicted on the jade mural was unlike any he had ever seen!

This mountain was majestic and precipitous, soaring into the clouds. There was no mountain this tall in Lingling!

Let alone Lingling, the entire Divine Land probably didn't have such a magnificent and wondrous mountain!

A thought flickered through Xu Ying's mind, and he softly recited, "South of the Xiao and Xiang rivers, the Cangwu Abyss. Beneath Mount Jiuyi, the Ageless Immortal. Could the mountain in the painting be Mount Jiuyi?"

"But Mount Jiuyi isn't this tall at all!"

Xu Ying was filled with confusion. He had been to Mount Jiuyi several times. Although it was as beautiful as a painting, its peaks were not high, so it couldn't be the mountain in the painting!

However, if Mount Wu Wang could become Mount Wu Wang, then perhaps the true appearance of Mount Jiuyi was this wondrous mountain in the painting?

"It's a shame Yuan Qi is in seclusion. Otherwise, I could go to Mount Jiuyi to take a look."

Xu Ying was also a little tired. He chose a room to stay in. He had been on the run these past few days and was truly exhausted, but his spirit was very high. He couldn't fall asleep for a while, so he simply took a book from the bookshelf to read.

After reading two or three pages of the book, Xu Ying's head tilted, and he fell asleep with a snort.

He slept for a long time. Xu Ying opened his sleepy eyes and woke up from his dream, feeling his Blood Essence surge. There was a strange vitality in Qin Yan Cave that caused his Blood Essence cultivation to improve continuously. He had only slept here for one night and felt that his cultivation had improved significantly!

"Truly a blessed land!"

Xu Ying suddenly smelled a strange odor on his body, likely from passing through the Underworld and picking up its decaying scent.

Yuan Qi was still in seclusion and had not yet woken up.

He came outside the palace, stripped himself completely naked, and jumped into the pool outside the palace.

"Huh, I've grown a few little hairs," Xu Ying looked down and muttered in confusion, "Strange little hairs, growing everywhere. I'll just pluck them off."

He scrubbed away the dirt on his body, then touched the place where he had been injured before. Seeing a Ganoderma grass on the shore, he suddenly froze.

"No, no!"

Xu Ying stood dumbfounded. After a long while, he mumbled, "Is it the vitality of Qin Yan Cave healing me, or my own vitality healing me? Is the strange energy in Qin Yan Cave truly vitality?"

He had seen grass and trees grow wildly under the influence of vitality, but the Ganoderma grass on the shore was not growing wildly.

This meant that the vitality emanating from Qin Yan Cave was not true vitality. The power that healed the scars on Xu Ying and Yuan Qi did not come from Qin Yan Cave, but from themselves!

"This mysterious power in Qin Yan Cave can stimulate our own vitality!"

Xu Ying's eyes flickered. Where did the vitality within the human body come from?

"Ni Wan Secret Treasury," he whispered.

The Ni Wan Secret Treasury contained the body's vitality, and this White Jade Palace was also called Ni Wan Palace. He had previously felt that Ni Wan Palace had some connection to Ni Wan, and now he suddenly realized it.

"The mysterious power in Qin Yan Cave can stimulate the Ni Wan Secret Treasury!"

Xu Ying sat in the water, muttering to himself, "That's right, it's the Ni Wan Secret Treasury. I just need to track the mysterious power of Qin Yan Cave and its path into the body, then I can use Dragon Seeking Positioning to find the Ni Wan Secret Treasury within the human body! But I'm not injured..."

Thinking this, he suddenly raised his hand and pointed, his finger force piercing through his own thigh!

Blood flowed profusely from his thigh. Xu Ying endured the pain and immediately focused his attention. Under his eyelids, divine light shimmered, and his divine sense reappeared!

He pushed open a door and entered the Realm of Serenity within his body.

In his internal world, faint streams of energy seeped in from the external world. These faint streams were the mysterious power that had seeped into his body from the mud pool!

These faint streams were attracted to a mysterious place within him and flowed in the same direction.

"As expected!"

Xu Ying's divine sense followed these streams as they soared, roaming afar!

His divine sense moved like lightning, whistling and traversing, rising higher and higher. It reached his heart and lungs, which were as vast as inverted mountains, but it did not stop!

He followed the streams through the Realm of Serenity, roaming to places he had never reached before, discovering more of the human body's mysteries.

He looked up. Above him was like the interior of an immensely vast pagoda, layered in order, while on either side were the majestic mountains of his heart and lungs.

His divine sense whistled, flying over the mountains of his heart and lungs, tracking the streams through layer after layer of majestic pagodas. Ahead, he suddenly saw a bright light. When he flew closer, it was a vast pool, like a lake or sea, the Jade Pool!

Above the Jade Pool, a divine bridge was suspended!

Xu Ying was mesmerized. Following the streams, he flew across the divine bridge and looked up to see an unimaginably large sun hanging in the sky, burning with fierce flames!

Beside the sun was an incredibly large moon, emitting a cold radiance, complementing the great sun!

"Within me, there are so many places I've never been!"

Xu Ying's divine sense passed between the sun and moon, following the streams as they soared upwards, arriving at a vast and unfathomable region within the Realm of Serenity!

A chaotic region in his brain.

His divine sense floated before the chaotic energy in his mind. In the center of this chaotic energy was a ball of chaos, like a super large, super round egg, floating in the center of the chaotic energy.

The mysterious energy from the mud pool drilled into this chaotic round egg and disappeared without a trace. Then, his physical vitality was stimulated, healing his bodily injuries!

"This chaotic round egg is the Ni Wan Secret Treasury of the Six Secrets of the Human Body!"

Xu Ying calmed himself. The Ni Wan Secret Treasury was right before him. He had found this secret treasury without relying on the Dragon Seeking Positioning of other Great Nu Masters!

"But finding it is one thing, opening it is another!"

Just as Xu Ying thought this, the chaotic region in his mind suddenly trembled, rippling.

He looked towards where the ripples came from and was stunned.

He saw a Great Bell that had barged in from somewhere, swaying unsteadily as if drunk. It flew above the chaotic energy and then stopped beside the chaotic round egg.

The Great Bell tried to push the chaotic round egg aside with force. Seeing that it couldn't move it, it settled down.

On the bell's surface, there was a deep palm print – it was the same Great Bell that had been following Xu Ying!

The Great Bell then noticed Xu Ying's divine sense floating not far away. The two looked at each other, and silence fell.

The Great Bell silently flew up and out of this brain region.

Xu Ying waited for a moment. The Great Bell slowly flew back, and seeing that Xu Ying's divine sense was still there, it knew it hadn't made a mistake.

"Young man, you're here too?" the Great Bell boomed like a great bell.

Xu Ying's divine sense surged, "What do you mean 'I'm here too'? This is my brain, alright? How did you get in?"

"Through your Jade Pillow acupoint at the back of your head," the Great Bell replied honestly. "Your Blood Essence cultivation improved, and my injuries also healed a bit during that time. Seeing you didn't bring me along, I decided to come in and settle down first."

Ever since Xu Ying entered Qin Yan Cave, his injuries had healed, and various hidden ailments within his body were cured. His Blood Essence became even more vigorous than before. The Great Bell took the opportunity to absorb more of Xu Ying's Blood Essence to recover its mobility ahead of schedule.

It had planned to enter Xu Ying's mind to steal more Blood Essence to heal itself. It hadn't expected to encounter the owner, which made it somewhat awkward.

Xu Ying didn't pursue the matter and asked, "Why were you near my Ni Wan Secret Treasury?"

"This is the Ni Wan Secret Treasury?" the Great Bell was very surprised. It flew around the chaotic, round egg a few times, marveling, "No wonder I couldn't budge it. I entered your mind through your Jade Pillow acupoint and didn't know this was the Ni Wan Secret Treasury."

Xu Ying explained how he tracked the mysterious energy in Qin Yan Cave and found this place using Dragon Seeking Positioning. He said, "When the mysterious energy entered this place, my physical body's vitality was stimulated, indicating that this must be the Ni Wan Secret Treasury."

In the Great Bell's era, there was no concept of "secret treasuries" within the human body. Hearing this, it was somewhat confused and said, "The Ni Wan Palace Cave Heaven, why would there be mysterious energy that can stimulate the Ni Wan Secret Treasury? How strange."

Xu Ying replied, "Cave Heavens and Blessed Lands possess mysterious spiritual energy and power, isn't that normal?"

The Great Bell sneered, "Do you think Cave Heavens and Blessed Lands are like cabbage, growing everywhere? Cave Heavens and Blessed Lands are numbered, and each has a profound origin. Although this place is an ancient cave dwelling, it's impossible for it to contain a Cave Heaven! The owner of this place calling it the Ni Wan Palace Cave Heaven is just trying to flatter himself."

Xu Ying pondered, "If this mysterious energy in Qin Yan Cave isn't spiritual energy or power, then it's indeed strange. This power is likely not naturally formed..."

His eyes suddenly lit up, and he smiled, "If I can follow the direction of the mysterious energy to find the Ni Wan Secret Treasury, then I can also follow the origin of the mysterious energy to find its source!"