Black Mountain

After completing the procedures for advancing to a Yellow Tier inner disciple, Dong Lin returned to the Spirit Chamber.

After two months of hard work, selling spirit insect shells had earned Dong Lin five hundred and sixty low-grade spirit stones.

If the Mystic Spirit Heavenly-Thunder had not been so destructive this time and annihilated a batch of excellent shells, he could have earned at least another hundred.

Still, every loss came with a gain.

Being accepted under the Fifth Elder had truly caught Dong Lin off guard.

He knew far too little about the relevant matters and had no idea whether taking a master required any traditional procedures.

He had heard that formal apprenticeship required some sort of ceremony, but he did not know whether the Fifth Elder had such cumbersome customs.

Zheng Huayuan and Li Lei mistakenly believed that Dong Lin had spent merely two months cultivating diligently and raised the Thunder Summoning Art from having no foundation to great mastery, even displaying a trace of perfected Thunder Spirit True Intent.

Little did they know that Dong Lin had barely spent any time on that thunder technique.

He had devoted himself wholeheartedly to cultivating the Dao Xuan Heart Sutra.

Dong Lin truly had grievances he could not voice.

Relying on his ability to suffer almost no depletion of spiritual sense, Dong Lin studied the Dao Xuan Heart Sutra day and night.

It had taken him two months just to barely get started.

One had to know that the effort Dong Lin expended cultivating in a single day was comparable to the spiritual sense power ordinary disciples would consume over five or six days.

And those had to be diligent disciples wholly devoted to cultivation.

In other words, with Dong Lin's talent, if he did not have the convenience of inexhaustible spiritual sense power,

it would take him around a year to get started with this foundational cultivation method of the Heaven Sect's inner sect.

Ordinary inner disciples needed only around half a year on average to get started with the Dao Xuan Heart Sutra.

As for peerless prodigies at the level of Dao heirs, they could get started with this moderately difficult technique in less than half a month.

This showed just how unimpressive Dong Lin's own talent for cultivation truly was.

Dong Lin had realized this himself, so he did not dare stop cultivating for even a moment.

Before achieving success in cultivation, Dong Lin did not even plan to leave the mountain.

When he had first arrived in this world, that all-encompassing yin wind that pierced straight into his soul had still left him deeply shaken.

This world was certainly not so peaceful. Who knew where a group of people might be secretly watching him?

After all, his original body's parents had not died by accident. There had to be a group of enemies somewhere within the cultivation world.

Based on Dong Lin's instincts from reading webnovels for so many years, he was certain this matter was not simple.

Unfortunately, he was currently insignificant and weak in cultivation, still unable to investigate the matter.

"Anyway, I should cultivate first. Though this world has little entertainment,

roaming the heavens and earth and living freely for tens of thousands of years is still an immense attraction to me.

After all, who doesn't dream of becoming an immortal?"

Early the next morning, Dong Lin tidied his clothes and appearance before arriving at the foot of Black Mountain.

Foundation Establishment experts could wield objects and fly, while only great Golden Core cultivators could walk through the air.

This mountain floated nearly a hundred meters above the ground. With his own strength, Dong Lin could hardly reach its foot.

There was no sign of anyone guarding the mountain below.

After looking around for a while, Dong Lin failed to find the Elder Feng whom Elder Zheng had mentioned yesterday.

Left with no choice, he took out the passage token from yesterday.

The token itself showed nothing extraordinary, and Dong Lin raised it.

"Eh, a Black Mountain Token? You're a newly admitted true disciple? How come this old man hasn't heard a single word about it?"

An old man's voice sounded behind Dong Lin, yet Dong Lin had sensed nothing unusual beforehand.

Is this the strength of a profound cultivator? He approached behind me without making a sound.

When Dong Lin heard the voice behind him, he was so startled that cold sweat covered his body.

One had to know that the area below Black Mountain was completely open, with white jade paving stones beneath his feet.

With no cover anywhere around, the old man had suddenly appeared behind him, giving Dong Lin a real fright.

Turning around, he saw an old man dressed in simple hemp clothes, his back bent with age.

"May I ask if you are Elder Feng, Senior? This disciple has come to Black Mountain to see Elder Zheng. I ask Senior to send this disciple up the mountain."

Elder Feng nodded, produced a lotus leaf in his hand, and tossed it onto the ground, signaling Dong Lin to step onto it.

Once Dong Lin had found his footing, the lotus leaf rose into the air and steadily flew toward the mountain's foot.

"Old Zheng accepted a disciple? Looks like the sect will have another thunder cultivator."

Elder Feng muttered a few words to himself, then turned and vanished from Dong Lin's sight.

The hundred-meter distance was crossed in an instant.

Once the lotus leaf came to a stop, Dong Lin jumped down from it, half a meter above the ground.

He landed firmly at the foot of Black Mountain.

A few steps back lay sheer cliffs. With Dong Lin's current cultivation,

if his foot slipped and he fell from the mountain, he might not even leave behind a corpse.

The spiritual energy on the mountain was indeed dense. Even at the mountain's foot,

Dong Lin could feel that the spiritual energy density here was not much lower than in the Spirit Chamber where he cultivated.

With every stretch of distance he traveled up the mountain, the spiritual energy density quietly rose a little.

The Thunder Division, where the Fifth Elder Zheng Huayuan resided, was located halfway up Black Mountain. Another dozen meters higher, and one would enter the shrouding clouds and mist.

The dense spiritual energy halfway up the mountain seemed as though it might condense into spiritual liquid and drip down at any moment.

Dong Lin was already finding this dense spiritual energy difficult to bear.

At this moment, Dong Lin had accumulated one hundred and twenty-three units of spiritual power in his dantian.

He was still far from completing the Mid Qi Refining Stage.

After breaking through to the Mid Qi Refining Stage, Dong Lin's dantian capacity had increased by roughly one hundred and six units.

His dantian could now hold around two hundred and ten units of spiritual power.

In other words, he still lacked nearly eighty units before reaching completion of the Mid Qi Refining Stage.

In the past, even if Dong Lin cultivated day and night, it would take nearly three months to get there.

But now, Dong Lin felt the spiritual power within his dantian growing unusually active.

His cultivation technique was slowly circulating unconsciously on its own,

and the dense spiritual energy environment was driving the spiritual power within him to grow naturally.

It was utterly outrageous!

In the brief half hour it took him to climb halfway up the mountain,

the total spiritual power in his body had increased by nearly a tenth of a unit, almost equivalent to circulating one Lesser Celestial Circuit.

"If I cultivated here every day, even a pig could attain the Dao."

Dong Lin secretly marveled.

In his previous life, excessive oxygen concentration could cause oxygen intoxication. Today, Dong Lin felt as though he was about to become "spiritually intoxicated."

He did not dare imagine how absurd the spiritual energy would become if a spirit-gathering formation were set up here,

let alone higher up the mountain.

As expected of a treasured cultivation ground capable of supporting Nascent Soul great cultivators, its reputation was well deserved.

Following the jade token's guidance, he arrived at the Thunder Division.

The Thunder Division belonged to the Fifth Elder, Zheng Huayuan.

It was also a treasured ground the sect had specially established for gifted cultivators of lightning techniques.

Within the Heaven Sect, Zheng Huayuan accepted disciples with talent in lightning techniques into the Thunder Division

to cultivate lightning techniques.

The uniquely formidable killing power of lightning techniques had established thunder cultivators as fierce and domineering combatants.

They were no less formidable than sword cultivators, who stood first in offensive killing power.

Few cultivators in the cultivation world were named after the element they cultivated.

There were no terms such as fire cultivators, water cultivators, or even special elemental cultivators like ice cultivators,

but thunder cultivators were the sole exception.

The Heaven Sect's higher-ups recognized this and established the Thunder Division.

Zheng Huayuan, an elder specializing in lightning techniques, served as the head of the Thunder Division.

Although Elder Zheng held several positions, the Thunder Division was not particularly busy.

This was because the requirements for cultivating lightning techniques were too demanding,

making it difficult even for a massive immortal sect like the Heaven Sect to produce cultivators with lightning affinity.

Whenever one appeared, the sect treated them like treasure.

It was said that only upon reaching the legendary Spirit Transformation realm, where mastering one path meant mastering all paths,

would the advantages of thunder cultivators gradually become less apparent.