No one understood Xiao Hua better than Cui Hongshen. This fellow was the sort who could not be bothered with social niceties, who would rather hide off to the side and secretly enjoy cultivating than make the acquaintance of any cultivators! Since Cui Hongshen objected, Zhen Minghui said no more. Aside from Xiao Hua, the most suitable candidate was Dui Qimeng! First, she was a female cultivator; second, she was a disciple of Dui Lei Palace. If she went with Cui Hongshen and Zhen Minghui, they would precisely represent the two thunder palaces of the First Squad. It truly accorded with proper etiquette!
Thus, without informing Xiao Hua, Cui Hongshen and the others followed the Quanjin Mountain disciples to Tu Hong's reception quarters.
Tu Hong was a Golden Core cultivator and one of Quanjin Mountain's regional lords. Need one even ask how grand his place for receiving guests was? Though it lacked the magnificence of a sect's reception hall, it far surpassed the Reception Hall of any ordinary cultivation family. Before them lay an oval space several hundred zhang across. Thick earthen-yellow pillars stood throughout, so massive that several cultivators likely could not have encircled one with their arms. Intricate runes were engraved upon those pillars, linked to the runes on the floor and ceiling. Faint ripples of spiritual power flickered out, yet when divine sense swept over them, they vanished in a flash like a startled swan, leaving no trace behind!
The pillars were exceedingly tall, more than a hundred zhang in height. Their tops were likewise an azure hue, like a clear blue sky. The white clouds above that blue sky connected with one another, forming those intricate runes! Within the gaps between the runes were hundreds, thousands—indeed, tens of thousands—of Minghua Stones embedded throughout, illuminating the entire