Heavenly Stellar Earth-Thunder

"Since I promised to help Senior Brother Lü nurture these three seeds, I should cultivate the Earth-Thunder first."

Cultivating the Heavenly Stellar Earth-Thunder was no longer as easy and casual as the Thunder Summoning Art.

The first step required the cultivator to grasp the True Intent of Thunder, use the power of that true intent, circulate spiritual energy through complex channels, connect with heaven and earth, and thereby release the Heavenly Stellar Earth-Thunder.

This lightning art did not rely on favorable timing or terrain, nor did it originate from within the cultivator's body. Lightning was born from the void; wherever divine sense reached, it could be unleashed with a single thought.

"Isn't anything involving the concept of the void far too complicated?"

Dong Lin had studied at the Immortal Arts Hall for so long that he had gained a rough understanding of several true-intent attributes.

Yet he had never heard of the concept of the void.

The void was everywhere. Wherever there was space, there was void.

Trying to comprehend even a trace of the void's power in order to wield this Heavenly Stellar Earth-Thunder truly stumped Dong Lin for a long time.

Fortunately, the golden orb contained not only the technique itself, but also explanations of its underlying principles.

It was equivalent to an immortal who had mastered the technique completely pouring every detail of its cultivation process and understanding straight into Dong Lin's mind.

Although Dong Lin only half understood its contents, as long as he spent enough time on it, he would eventually understand it all.

After the ceremony, Dong Lin cultivated continuously for more than three months.

Other than tending to the Spirit Field on schedule, he devoted all his remaining time to cultivating the Heavenly Stellar Earth-Thunder.

When he opened the hall doors, winter had descended upon heaven and earth, and all things lay dormant.

The entire Heaven Hall Inner Realm had been veiled in a faint layer of white.

Dong Lin held out his hand and caught two snowflakes drifting slowly down.

He watched the hexagonal flakes gradually melt in his palm.

"The weather in the Inner Realm is actually this realistic? I wonder whether it's synchronized with the outside world."

Dong Lin mounted an immortal crane and left the Heaven Hall through the teleportation array.

Outside, the sun shone brilliantly despite the approaching winter. The sky stretched cloudless for thousands of miles, with no trace of snow in sight.

"Does the Inner Realm's weather system operate independently? It already counts as a small world of its own, doesn't it?"

Dong Lin fell into thought.

The immortal cranes were raised by a branch under the sect's Cavern Repository. Generally, every personal disciple who had yet to reach Foundation Establishment

and needed to travel would be specially assigned one for transportation.

This spared Elder Feng from constantly having to ferry personal disciples up and down Black Mountain.

Dong Lin arrived at the market and sold off most of the Qi-Gathering Pills on him, retaining only one bottle of Black-Tier Mid-Grade Qi-Gathering Pills for emergencies.

Besides aiding cultivation, Qi-Gathering Pills could also be consumed during magical combat to replenish the spiritual energy depleted by casting spells.

Although their effects were similar to specialized Spirit-Replenishing Pills, they were much more expensive than Spirit-Replenishing Pills of the same function,

so most cultivators would specifically keep Spirit-Replenishing Pills on hand.

But Dong Lin truly had little use for them in cultivation,

so, being well supplied with money, he felt there was no need to buy an additional bottle of Spirit-Replenishing Pills.

After all, he had no need to fight anyone for the time being. It was better to keep a bottle of Qi-Gathering Pills.

"If I'm forced to take medicine, I wonder whether I can handle the immense spiritual energy of Black-Tier Qi-Gathering Pills."

After selling the pills, along with the insect shells he had harvested over the past few months,

he counted his spirit stones over and over again, then nodded in satisfaction.

At this point, Dong Lin possessed more than 3,800 low-grade spirit stones.

Qi-Gathering Pills were valuable enough to begin with, especially Black-Tier Qi-Gathering Pills.

A bottle of Black-Tier Low-Grade pills sold for roughly 500 low-grade spirit stones on the market.

The four bottles Dong Lin had sold brought him a total of 2,000 spirit stones.

He had not returned to his Spirit Chamber for a long time, yet everything inside remained unchanged.

Thanks to the wonders of the Heaven Hall, as long as no outside clutter was brought in, almost no dust accumulated within.

The entire Spirit Chamber was still clean and tidy.

Dong Lin stored the jar of spirit tea in his ring and looked around.

The meditation cushion that was quite effective at calming the mind was no longer needed, since Dong Lin now had something better.

However, the Hanging-Eyed White Tiger Painting on the wall caught his attention.

There seemed to be some secret concealed within it, but Dong Lin could not quite say where it lay.

He gave it no further thought and put the painting into his ring first, planning to study it carefully when he had time.

After nearly three months, Dong Lin had only barely entered the threshold of the Heavenly Stellar Earth-Thunder.

His cultivation had also naturally increased by ten units due to Black Mountain's abundant spiritual energy.

There were now 133 units of spiritual energy accumulated within his dantian.

Next, Dong Lin intended to focus entirely on raising his cultivation.

Cultivation was the foremost priority for a cultivator; realm was the foundation of everything.

Only once one's realm rose could the power of one's techniques increase, and only then could one's horizons broaden.

He took some spirit-infused soil from the Spirit Field and filled a clay pot he had casually bought at the market.

After returning to Thunderwave Hall, he planted the three seeds Senior Brother Lü had given him.

"The Earth-Thunder governs growth. Its effects should be better than the True Intent-infused heavenly lightning Senior Brother requested. If it doesn't work, I can nourish them with heavenly lightning instead."

Dong Lin activated the Heavenly Stellar Earth-Thunder. Three finger-thick currents of electricity wrapped around the three seeds.

Though the electric plasma was sparse, the flickering purple light contained lightning power so intense that it made one's heart pound.

He planned to nourish them like this every day for a few days. If there was still no movement, he would try heavenly lightning instead.

In roughly ten breaths, more than half of Dong Lin's spiritual energy had already been consumed.

After withdrawing his hand, he placed the clay pot in the alchemy room and turned to leave.

"Hm?"

A faint cracking sound made Dong Lin stop. He lowered his head to look at the Date Spirit Thunderwood seeds in the clay pot.

The slightly larger seed had split open at the top of its shell, and a touch of green sprout could be faintly seen within.

"The effect is this good?!"

Dong Lin had underestimated the Earth-Thunder's effects.

"Tomorrow, if I do this once more, the other two seeds should successfully sprout as well."

Dong Lin nodded in satisfaction and turned back to cultivate.

Before cultivating, he took out the white tiger painting he had previously placed in his ring from the cultivation Spirit Chamber and hung it in his cultivation room.

"It does feel like a pretty nice decoration."

Dong Lin looked at the lifelike white tiger and nodded in satisfaction.

Early the next morning, after finishing his cultivation, Dong Lin stretched and prepared to deal with the seeds first.

Two knocking sounds came from outside the hall doors.

"Is Brother Dong here?"

The visitor was Gu Chen, a newly promoted true disciple of the Dragon Splendor Sword Pavilion.

"Senior Brother Gu, what brings you here today?"

"At the last ceremony, we didn't even add each other as contacts. I asked around,

but none of the senior brothers and junior brothers I knew had Brother Dong's contact information, so I had no choice but to come find you in person."

"When I was in the outer sect, I really didn't know many people. What brings Senior Brother here?"

"Junior Sister Tao, Baili Tianming from the Law Enforcement Hall, and I have recently been discussing forming a permanent team

so we can enter secret realms together to explore and gain experience. We thought Brother Dong would be a good fit, so we wanted to ask whether you would be interested in joining."

"A team?"

Dong Lin considered it for a moment, then nodded.

"Thank you, Brother Gu, for thinking of me.

I hope Brother Gu can guide me more in the future. I may still be lacking when it comes to actual combat."

"Haha, that's easy enough. Go out and gain experience a few more times, and combat experience will naturally follow.

Honestly, given Brother Dong's personality as a cultivation maniac, I originally thought you might not be willing to form a team and go out with us."

"Oh, right. We plan to register our team with the Hunting Alliance. We'll put Brother Dong's name down when the time comes."

"Can we still register with the Hunting Alliance after the mountain has been sealed? Sure."