Passing through the curtain of water, thick with mist and roaring deafeningly, was like crossing an invisible boundary.
The clamor and force outside were cut off in an instant.
Li Qingshan stepped into the cave, feeling lighter all over, as though he had entered a place of profound stillness.
Before him lay a dry, tidy stone chamber, clearly carved out by human hands.
The years had left deep marks here, but they had not erased every trace.
A faint scent of sandalwood permeated the air, ancient and mysterious.
It had lingered through countless ages, as though its owner had only recently departed.
His gaze was immediately drawn to the sight at the center of the chamber.
A human skeleton sat quietly in the lotus position atop a prayer cushion that had long since faded, yet remained intact.
Its clothing had long since weathered away, leaving only bones as lustrous and white as jade. They gave off a faint glow, revealing the extraordinary cultivation their owner had possessed in life.
The skeleton's skull hung slightly, its posture peaceful, as though it had merely entered an eternal meditative trance.
Yet fine cracks covered its bones, especially the skull and breastbone.
Several obvious fractures silently spoke of the cruelty of time and the grievous injuries it had once suffered.
Before the skeleton lay a dull green jade slip with somewhat worn edges,
and a white jade medicine bottle the size of a palm, smooth, lustrous, and translucent.
His expression solemn, Li Qingshan straightened his clothes and headwear before the remains of this unknown senior, then bowed slightly and offered a respectful Daoist salute.
"This junior is Li Qingshan. I entered this treasured place by mistake, and disturbing your rest was truly unintentional, Senior.
If you do not object to this junior accepting the legacy you left behind, I shall put it to good use and not let your life's work go to waste."
Only after paying his respects did he step forward and carefully pick up the green jade slip.
The jade slip was cool and smooth to the touch, clearly made of extraordinary material.
He slowly extended his divine sense into it. At first, he met with slight resistance, but then a vast, intricate stream of profound information poured into his mind.
Unfortunately, it was not a cultivation inheritance, but an ocean of insights into pill refinement!
It encompassed everything, from identifying rare treasures and exotic herbs throughout the world and the principles of combining medicinal properties as sovereign, minister, assistant, and guide,
to various lost fire-control arts and pill-condensing hand seals, and dozens of mysterious pill formulas, among countless other things.
The contents were so profound and the insights so original that many of the ideas were unheard of, far beyond anything Li Qingshan currently knew.
They were unquestionably the collected life's work of a high-level master of pill refinement!
Regrettably, the jade slip seemed to be severely damaged. Much of the information within was incomplete, and the writing at many crucial points was blurred and illegible.
A great many pill formulas were also missing their most important sovereign ingredients or core refinement steps, greatly diminishing their value.
It was like a peerless classic from which someone had torn the most important pages.
"A Saint's pill-refinement notes. Every word is a pearl, but sadly, they're far too incomplete. It's like returning empty-handed from a mountain of treasure."
Li Qingshan carefully read through the contents that were still legible, both awed and regretful.
Even so, the surviving ideas and techniques were already an invaluable treasure for his future cultivation of the Pill Dao.
He carefully put the jade slip away to study at his leisure later.
Next, he picked up the white jade medicine bottle.
The bottle was smooth and warm to the touch, and it even had a faint ability to absorb the surrounding essence Qi. The jade itself was no ordinary material either.
He pulled out the stopper, which had likewise been carved from spirit jade, and a faint but exceptionally rich and refreshing medicinal fragrance immediately wafted out.
Merely breathing in a trace of it made his mouth water.
Even his soul seemed to grow a little lighter, leaving him refreshed.
Inside the bottle lay three pills the size of longan fruit, perfectly round and flawless, golden yellow in color, with naturally formed cloud patterns on their surfaces.
But the brilliant treasure light the pills should have possessed was noticeably dim.
The enticing medicinal fragrance was also far weaker than it had been at its peak.
Too much time had passed, and most of their medicinal potency had dissipated.
Even so, for cultivators in the early stage of the secret realm, these three impaired pills were still treasures one could encounter only by chance!
They were enough to raise the strength of their divine sense by a considerable margin!
"A good start. Not a bad haul."
Li Qingshan nodded in satisfaction and put the medicine bottle away carefully.
Finding so much so soon after entering this treasured place confirmed that opportunities truly were countless here, and made him look forward to further exploration all the more.
He looked at Xiaobai, who was curiously examining the skeleton nearby, and smiled.
"I have you to thank for this, Xiaobai. If not for you, I'm afraid I would have passed this cave abode by."
As he spoke, he took out a golden-yellow pill. Xiaobai immediately slithered over happily, green eyes sparkling with anticipation.
Xiaobai swallowed it in one gulp, and the little body seemed to brighten somewhat, looking utterly satisfied.
After absorbing it, Xiaobai affectionately rubbed against Li Qingshan's finger and gave a soft hiss,
conveying happiness and attachment.
After leaving the stone chamber behind the waterfall, Li Qingshan continued deeper into the ancient secret realm under Xiaobai's guidance.
The farther they traveled into Kunlun, the more ancient, desolate, and magnificent the surroundings appeared, and the more dangers they encountered.
They passed an enormous lake bed that had long since dried and cracked, so vast that its edges were nowhere in sight.
The earth at the bottom of the lake was no ordinary soil. It glittered like multicolored jade, yet was unusually hard underfoot.
Scattered across it were some astonishingly enormous fossilized beast bones.
One could imagine how terrifying those giant beasts had been in life.
At the center of the lake bed stood an enormous altar built from huge black stones.
It had now broken apart in the middle, with nearly half of it collapsed. The remaining section was covered in indecipherable ancient sacrificial patterns.
Amid the decay, the outlines of the Immortal Pool's former splendor and its sacred presence could still faintly be glimpsed.
They also saw broad stretches of neatly laid-out fields, crisscrossed by paths.
They had long since fallen into neglect, covered by thick spirit moss and unknown vines.
Yet the soil still gave off astonishing life essence Qi; breathing in a single breath made one feel as though it could prolong one's life.
One could imagine how extraordinary the precious medicines once grown here had been. Even the poorest of them would probably have caused a sensation in the outside world.
Now only a few scattered spirit herbs remained, relatively low in grade but still several thousand years old, swaying forlornly in the breeze. Li Qingshan picked the already extraordinary thousand-year-old spirit herbs, which hardly counted as a small gain.
Broken giant stone steles, ruined palace foundations, and shattered walls were an even more common sight.
Some steles were as large as mountains, lying across the ground, most of their ancient carvings and writing blurred.
Wind, rain, and time had worn their edges smooth, yet the few remaining traces still emanated a vast and desolate will that made the heart tremble.
They silently spoke of the glory this place had once known and a heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing stillness that had descended upon it without warning.
On a huge fragment of bronze, a distinct palm print could be seen, piercing through divine bronze of unknown thickness.
Even after countless ages, a trace of sharp Metal Qi still lingered around the edge of the palm print, making the skin prickle.
"Hiss."
Xiaobai also seemed able to sense the grief and killing intent permeating heaven and earth, and grew quiet.
No longer darting about playfully, Xiaobai simply followed silently at Li Qingshan's feet, occasionally raising a little head.
A trace of vigilance that seemed at odds with Xiaobai's size flashed through those green eyes.
Several hours later, they passed through a stone forest of rugged terrain and jagged rocks.
The stones here were all an eerie dark red, as though they had been soaked in blood and then endured countless ages.
At the center of the stone forest stood a lone, enormous dead tree.
The ancient tree was scorched black all over, its form twisted as though struggling, yet it stubbornly and defiantly pointed toward the sky.
Its trunk was so thick that even twenty people joining hands would probably have struggled to encircle it, and it towered far above the surrounding stone peaks.
One could imagine that in life it must have been an extraordinary, wondrous being, its branches and leaves lush, its canopy like a cloud,
perhaps a symbol of a certain region. Though it had been dead for who knew how many tens of thousands of years, it still radiated a faint pressure that made the heart tremble.
As Xiaobai passed by, Xiaobai suddenly stopped again and hissed at the enormous dead tree,
repeatedly pointing a little tail toward the base of its roots, seeming rather eager.
"Hm? You've found something else here?"
Li Qingshan looked at Xiaobai, already utterly convinced of that treasure-hunting talent.
"Hiss! Hiss!"
Xiaobai nodded vigorously, then even slithered over and repeatedly rubbed a head against a thick root coiled like a dragon.
Xiaobai then looked back at Li Qingshan, motioning for him to hurry over.
Li Qingshan did as indicated, stepping forward and pushing aside the deep accumulation of dead branches, leaves, and soil beneath the tree to search carefully.
The soil here carried a faint scorched smell.
Soon, his fingertips touched something cold, hard, and angular.
He carefully dug it out and brushed away the dirt, finding what seemed to be half a broken sword, only the tip, less than a foot long.
The blade was dull and lusterless, covered in thick rust and dust and riddled with cracks like a spiderweb.
It looked as though it might crumble completely into scrap iron at any moment, a truly sorry sight.
Yet when Li Qingshan picked it up, his hand suddenly sank under its weight!
The broken sword was far heavier than its size warranted!
It was practically a lump of divine iron!
Its material was also exceptionally unusual. Though it had lost nearly all its spirituality and was utterly lifeless,
when he touched it, his fingertips could still feel a faint lingering trace of peerless sharpness that reached into the marrow and could sever all things!
In particular, beneath the rust, his keen divine sense detected several nearly imperceptible silver-white specks, flickering like starlight,
like tiny stars in the night sky.
"Is this mixed with Great Luo silver essence?"
A flash of surprise crossed Li Qingshan's eyes.
Great Luo silver essence was a top-grade divine material used to refine king-grade divine weapons and even higher-grade artifacts.
It was hard to find anywhere in the world; a thumb-sized piece was enough to make mighty experts fight until their heads broke and blood flowed!
There was quite a lot of it in this broken sword, making the material itself astonishingly valuable!
"Even a fragment of the sword tip contains Great Luo silver essence. What grade must this sword have been when it was whole?
And what sort of person could have broken it?"
Thoughts raced through Li Qingshan's mind, and he raised his assessment of the danger here another notch.
He carefully brushed the dirt off the broken sword, then searched deeper in the same spot. His fingertips touched something tough.
He dug it out and found an object tightly wrapped in some kind of strange beast hide.
Its exterior was coated with a layer of dark brown grease that had long since congealed and hardened, yet could still block probing.
He carefully peeled away the layers of protection, revealing a piece of unknown beast hide that had been exceptionally well treated, soft in texture yet remarkably tough.
A secret technique was recorded on the hide in ancient silver runes.
"Light-Splitting Shadow-Manifesting Sword Control Technique."
Li Qingshan quickly skimmed its contents. At first, he thought it was another incomplete secret technique,
but the more he read, the happier he grew.
This was no fragment, but a supreme sword art that was exceptionally complete, rigorously structured, and led directly to the Great Dao!
It began with a method for tempering divine consciousness and condensing a sword-intent seed, with extremely demanding requirements.
None but those with powerful divine consciousness and steadfast wills could cultivate it.
After that came the foundational sections, covering how to nourish one's bonded sword and how to control Qi with the mind and the sword with Qi,
then the advanced sections on splitting sword light and controlling sword shadows,
and finally the supreme realm, where sword light became shadows, illusion and reality gave rise to each other, and one could lay down a killing formation of countless sword shadows with a single thought.
Everything was explained with perfect clarity and extraordinary profundity!
It was a complete secret cultivation technique that could serve as a foundational inheritance!
Not only did it contain powerful sword-control techniques for attack and slaughter,
but its methods for tempering divine consciousness and condensing sword intent were themselves a top-grade secret technique for cultivating the soul, of immeasurable value!
"I've struck treasure!"
Li Qingshan was overjoyed.
This technique perfectly remedied his current lack of a powerful, flexible means of ranged attack that could continue to improve.
In particular, its core lay in control through divine sense, making it an ideal complement to his powerful divine consciousness. It was practically tailor-made for him!
He could almost foresee that once he mastered it, his combat strength would surely rise enormously!
With sword light splitting apart and illusion indistinguishable from reality, he could trap and kill thousands in a group battle, or decide life and death within a few steps in a duel!
"Good! Good! Good!"
Li Qingshan exclaimed "good" three times in succession, unable to hide his excitement.
He carefully committed the contents of the beast hide to memory, making sure he missed nothing.
He carefully put away both the broken sword and the beast hide bearing the complete Light-Splitting Shadow-Manifesting Sword Control Technique.
Later, he could try using true fire to carefully extract the incomparably precious Great Luo silver essence from the broken sword
and forge it anew into a sword for battle.
The immortal mountain's true face was gradually unfolding, and he had obtained his first treasures from its hidden legacy.
Obtaining the complete and powerful inheritance of the Light-Splitting Shadow-Manifesting Sword Control Technique made Li Qingshan very happy.
"Xiaobai, you really are my lucky star! You've made a great contribution!"
Li Qingshan's mood grew even brighter. The rewards of this expedition had far exceeded his expectations.
Once again, he generously condensed a mass of even purer and richer heaven and earth essence Qi to reward Xiaobai.
Xiaobai happily absorbed the delicious treat, every scale on the little body shimmering with a delighted luster.
Xiaobai also seemed to greatly enjoy the process of helping Li Qingshan find treasures and then receiving generous rewards,
those lively green eyes full of accomplishment.
They continued exploring.
Along the way, with Xiaobai's keen guidance, Li Qingshan avoided several dangerous forbidden areas in advance, each giving off fluctuations that made his heart tremble.
Once, they gave a wide berth to a seemingly peaceful valley wreathed in purple Qi,
Xiaobai conveyed a thought of extreme fear, and Li Qingshan carefully probed the valley with his divine sense.
Sure enough, he discovered a terrifying ancient beast lurking inside. It resembled a fierce tiger, had a pair of wings on its back, and snored like thunder.
The presence it gave off made even his scalp tingle.
Another time, Xiaobai refused to go anywhere near an area covered in clusters of multicolored crystals, no matter what.
Li Qingshan picked up a stone and tossed it in.
In an instant, countless tiny spatial rifts appeared out of thin air and sliced the stone into its most basic particles, scaring him into hurriedly retreating.