The Immortal Pool lay atop Spirit Jade Mountain amid the mountain range of the Beast Taming Immortal Sect.
Elder Li led the top three disciples of the inner sect competition—two men and one woman—and drifted gracefully to the outside of the Immortal Pool.
A grand cloud-and-mist formation shrouded the Immortal Pool.
Beyond the formation stood seven nine-story treasure pagodas, each inhabited by a Spirit Transformation expert stationed there as a guardian.
The Immortal Pool—
Throughout the entire Eastern Jin, it was a one-of-a-kind existence. Thus, the Beast Taming Immortal Sect guarded it with extreme strictness. Apart from a select few such as the sect master, no one else was permitted to enter this place.
When Elder Li appeared outside the Immortal Pool formation with the three inner sect disciples, one guardian flew out of a treasure pagoda and landed before the four of them.
"These three are the top three from this year's inner sect disciple competition?"
The guardian swept his gaze over the three of them, then his eyes settled on Chen Changming as he said in surprise, "Strange. Why is there a disciple at the eighth level of the Golden Core realm this time?"
"Senior, he is Chen Shan, the champion of this competition."
Elder Li replied with a bitter smile.
"This lad is that formidable?"
The guardian froze for a moment, then smiled easily. "I hope the Immortal Pool can add flowers to the brocade for someone with a heavenly spirit root like him, further improving his spirit root aptitude."
Elder Li's expression turned awkward at those words.
The other two inner sect disciples, Murong Yan and Jiang Biehe, were also so ashamed they wished they could burrow into the ground.
Though the two of them possessed heavenly spirit roots and were at higher realms than Chen