Houtu shook her head at Nuwa and said, "A loss is a loss. How could I, an Ancestral Witch, refuse to honor my word? The Nine Heavens Breathing Soil is halfway up Buzhou Mountain, thirty thousand miles southeast of the Ancestral Witch Hall."
"However, there's a Spiritual Root growing on the Nine Heavens Breathing Soil. It should be ripe in about a thousand years."
Hearing Houtu's words, Qing Xuan frowned and asked her outright, "Is the Spiritual Root growing on the Nine Heavens Breathing Soil a green lotus?"
Houtu's eyes widened as she looked at Qing Xuan. "You know about it too? What a shame. You won this time for nothing—you won't get any benefit."
At that moment, Houtu actually had a smile on her face, as if she'd just lost several million, only to casually find it again.
But Qing Xuan didn't have time to worry about any of that. He grabbed Houtu's hand and stuffed the Pangu Marrow into it.
"Take this, and hurry up and take me to see that green lotus. If we're any later, someone else might pick it."
Houtu had thought that since she'd lost, she'd never get the Pangu Marrow. She hadn't expected Qing Xuan to give it to her, and for a moment she stood there, stunned.
Nuwa smiled sweetly and tugged at Houtu. "Keep it. The Little Gourd Vine prepared it for you in the first place."
"In return, hurry and take him to find that Azure Lotus. If someone else really takes it, you won't have a gift to thank him with."
Houtu hadn't realized that Qing Xuan had sought out this drop of Pangu Marrow for her. She couldn't help feeling grateful to him.
She bowed to Qing Xuan. "Thank you, Daoist Little Gourd Vine. I'll always remember this great kindness."
Qing Xuan froze, his face covered in black lines. "Wait. You can thank me, but what do you mean, 'Daoist Little Gourd Vine'?"
"My name is Qing Xuan. My true form may be the Innate Gourd Vine, but I'm not called Little Gourd Vine. Remember that."
Nuwa rolled her eyes at Qing Xuan, then took Houtu's hand in one of hers and Qing Xuan's in the other. "Don't worry, Little Gourd Vine. Daoist Houtu will remember. Let's hurry and find the Azure Lotus."
At that moment, Qing Xuan wanted to raise his hand and smash the sky, just to vent his frustration.
Seeing Qing Xuan's crestfallen expression, Houtu couldn't help laughing again. Then she led Nuwa and Qing Xuan straight toward the Azure Lotus.
They were walking down Buzhou Mountain, so the Pangu Pressure was fairly weak. Besides, the Azure Lotus was only ten thousand miles away.
Unfortunately, even going downhill, they couldn't use escape arts. Reaching it in a thousand years would still be no easy task.
Seeing how slowly Qing Xuan and Nuwa were traveling, Houtu shook her head. "At this rate, the Azure Lotus will probably be ripe and taken by someone else before we get there."
"How about this? You two can sit on my shoulders. I'll use the Witch Clan's secret art, Shrink Ground to Inch, to get us there."
As she spoke, Houtu once again revealed her Ancestral Witch True Body and had Qing Xuan and Nuwa sit on her shoulders, one on each side.
Once they were settled, Houtu took a single step, covering several miles. If they hadn't been on Buzhou Mountain, that one step could have spanned tens of thousands of miles.
Even so, it took less than a day for Houtu to bring Nuwa and Qing Xuan to the area where the Azure Lotus was.
Houtu put away her Ancestral Witch True Body and pointed to a spot not far ahead. "It's in that pond."
Qing Xuan couldn't help sighing. "As expected of a Pangu Descendant. You really do have an advantage on your old man's turf."
He muttered under his breath, but his pace didn't slow. He headed straight for the pond ahead.
When he reached the edge of the pond, the first thing Qing Xuan looked at was the water, wondering if it was the Three Lights Divine Water he'd imagined.
Unfortunately, the result was a great disappointment. The water in the pond wasn't ordinary, but it couldn't compare to the Three Lights Divine Water.
The Azure Lotus in the middle of the pond, however, was just as Qing Xuan had expected. The Creation Qi it radiated alone was enough to convince him that it was the Twenty-Four Grade Creation Green Lotus.
The Twenty-Four Grade Creation Green Lotus hadn't yet ripened. Framed by its lotus leaves, it glimmered with a soft green light.
The few drops of water on its leaves, however, were indeed Three Lights Divine Water. Qing Xuan's eyes lit up at once.
"The droplets on my Gourd Leaf are Three Lights Divine Water, and the droplets on the Azure Lotus's leaves are too. Could the dew on every Top-grade Innate Spiritual Root be Three Lights Divine Water?"
"That can't be right. If it were, Yuanshi Tianzun shouldn't be the only one with Three Lights Divine Water. At the very least, Zhen Yuanzi, Queen Mother of the West, and Yaochi, all of whom have Top-grade Innate Spiritual Roots, should have some too."
"And Daoist Zhun Ti's true form is the Geng Jin Bodhi Tree. He should have Three Lights Divine Water as well. Why wasn't it mentioned in the original Primordial World Trajectory?"
Just then, Qing Xuan saw a glow of treasure-light beneath the Azure Lotus. Looking closely, he saw that it was a cup.
The cup had eight sides, corresponding to the eight directions. Each side bore an image: a Treasure Umbrella, a Golden Fish, a Treasure Vase, a Wondrous Lotus, a Right-coiled White Conch, an Auspicious Knot, a Victory Banner, and a Golden Wheel.
All the Three Lights Divine Water dripping from the lotus leaves flowed into the cup. Qing Xuan immediately recognized it and called out its name.
"Is this the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup? An Innate Spiritual Treasure made specifically to hold Three Lights Divine Water?"
As he spoke, Qing Xuan had already opened his Folding Fan. The Purple Gold Gourd hanging from it flew toward the Azure Lotus and instantly sucked the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup inside.
The Purple Gold Gourd flew back into Qing Xuan's hand. He hurriedly took out the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup and poured the Three Lights Divine Water he'd collected into it.
As the Three Lights Divine Water entered the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup, the cup began to radiate three-colored light.
Qing Xuan could sense a trace of the Creation Law within the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup. It caused the Three Lights Divine Water inside to slowly, steadily increase.
The process was slow, but the effect was real. This matched the description of the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup in the original Primordial World Trajectory.
Qing Xuan held the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup in his hands and said, "You two can find something to do. I'll refine this Eight Treasures Glazed Cup first."
With that, he sat cross-legged beside the pond, held the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup in his palm, and began tempering it with his Natal Heart Fire.
The Eight Treasures Glazed Cup was only a High-grade Innate Spiritual Treasure, with a total of thirty-two Innate Restrictions. It wasn't among the best High-grade Innate Spiritual Treasures, but it was still a rare treasure.
Five hundred years passed in the blink of an eye. Qing Xuan finally refined twenty-nine of the Eight Treasures Glazed Cup's Innate Restrictions.
The remaining three were the hardest restrictions to refine in any Innate Spiritual Treasure. Refining each one could take as long as all the time he'd spent refining the previous ones combined.
So Qing Xuan had no time to refine the final three Innate Restrictions. After all, there wasn't much time left before the Creation Green Lotus ripened.
Before you continue