Li Yan froze when he heard this. "Divine Sense—something that miraculous actually exists?" A moment later, however, he was left speechless. His room was only sixty or seventy feet from his teacher's. Did that not mean his teacher could know everything he did and said in his room?
The old man smiled faintly and continued, "Once Divine Sense becomes powerful enough, it can kill people directly. A powerful immortal cultivator needs only to send out a strand of Divine Sense to kill without leaving a trace, or even instantly slaughter whole swathes of beings weaker than himself. In short, Divine Sense grows stronger as your cultivation advances. After you reach the Nascent Soul Realm, several strands of Divine Sense can combine into a Divine Thought, whose capabilities are even greater. You will have to explore and learn about all this gradually yourself." The old man's voice had begun to sound distant and ethereal.
"After emerging from seclusion, I waited in the sect for about a hundred years, but no one from any of the four sects returned. By then, I had reached the early Body Integration Realm. Although I had gone out searching for an heir during the Spirit Transformation and Void Refinement Realms, I had found none, and there were still more distant places I had never visited. So I delayed no longer and set out again to find someone to inherit our sect's legacy. That journey lasted five or six hundred years. I crossed several vast continental regions, searched a thousand mountains and ten thousand rivers, deserts and remote extremes, yet still found no heir. In the end, I shattered the void once more and came to the Mortal Realm, hoping to find something here. Another two hundred years of searching in the Mortal Realm yielded nothing. Then, on one occasion, I received word of a hidden place in the Mortal Realm whose people might possess spiritual roots in greater numbers. But it lay in an exceedingly remote part of this realm. According to the information, even in ancient times, when the mighty cultivators of the Immortal Spirit Realm sought spiritual veins here to establish their legacies, they had failed to establish sects in that region. No records explaining why survived. All that was recorded was that its climate and spiritual energy were the finest in this realm, and that many people there possessed exceptional spiritual roots. To reach it, however, one had to traverse a long, perilous route plagued by strange red lightning tribulations. Its dangers were unlike anything even the Immortal Spirit Realm had seen. Supposedly, one needed at least the magical power of the Tribulation Transcendence Realm to pass through. After much deliberation, I decided to go and see for myself. Our sect's teachings could not be lost with my generation. Before leaving, however, I placed a Divine Thought inside an immortal-artifact jade box. This box can preserve a Divine Thought for tens of thousands of years without allowing it to dissipate, and can sense whether humans within several thousand miles possess spiritual roots. The me you see now is that Divine Thought. My original body has already gone to that unnamed place." The old man looked at Li Yan as he spoke.
By now, Li Yan had grown numb. He had encountered far too many miraculous—or perhaps bizarre—things today. Now that the old man claimed to consist of nothing but a Divine Thought, he might as well accept it. It was not impossible, after all. Thus, he felt no more surprise and simply listened.
"But I overlooked one thing: operating this immortal-artifact jade box continually consumes the power of my Divine Thought. At first, I stayed inside the box and drove it across this continent in search of an heir. Another thousand years passed like this, and I still found none. By then, however, I realized that if I kept searching this way, my Divine Thought might be exhausted in another few hundred thousand years and dissipate completely. So I devised a plan. I transformed the jade box into an ancient book of jade slips and remained inside it, allowing a cultivator to find the book. He would surely regard it as some immortal treasure or spiritual artifact. Of course, they absolutely
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could not unravel the mysteries within this book." At this point, immense confidence appeared on the gray-robed old man's face. Even though he was not the original body, but merely a Divine Thought, he still believed that no one in this realm could discern the secrets of the jade-slip book he had conjured.
"Having obtained this jade book yet being unable to fathom its secrets, they would treasure it all the more. Naturally, the safest course would be to carry it with them. That would let them study it whenever they wished, while keeping their precious treasure close at hand, where they felt most reassured. In that way, they would carry me from place to place. I only needed to keep scanning different regions as they moved, without expending additional Divine Thought power to operate the immortal-artifact jade box. And so this transformed jade book passed from one cultivator to another. Some were killed, and the next cultivator acquired it. Others carried it for hundreds of years before dying in seated meditation, their cultivation extinguished, after which another treasure seeker found it. Of course, none could ever unlock its secrets. But that is how people are: the more unattainable something is, the more precious they believe it to be. Thus they carried the jade book across one region of the Mortal Realm after another. A million long years passed this way. I found quite a few people with mixed spirit roots, but still no suitable heir. By then, I discovered that my Divine Thought had lost sixty or seventy percent of its strength. I also sensed that my original body probably had not found an heir, either, and had not perished. There is a connection between us. If he died, I would know. If he found an heir, I would know that too. Presumably, he had become trapped somewhere and could not escape. Otherwise, he should have come looking for me. Therefore, I had to keep searching for an heir. But using the previous method, this Divine Thought would probably last only another two or three hundred thousand years. I had no choice but to devise another approach: putting the main Divine Thought into a slumber to reduce consumption, while separating out a weaker strand of Divine Sense to roam outside it and perform the scanning in its place. Since it was only a weak strand of Divine Sense, it could scan a radius of merely a hundred miles or so to conserve its strength, and it had no offensive capabilities. Still, this was the best solution available. If this strand detected the person I sought, it would awaken the main Divine Thought, which could then assess that person's character and pass on the memories of our legacy. But this strand of Divine Sense could last only about a thousand years before dispersing. Before each dispersal, however, it would awaken the main Divine Thought and transmit everything it had seen and heard over those years. Then it would dissipate between heaven and earth. The main Divine Thought would separate out another strand of Divine Sense before returning to sleep. Of course, this would still gradually weaken the main Divine Thought, leaving it increasingly frail, but it would extend the time available for my search." As the old man recounted this at an unhurried pace, Li Yan remained silent, inwardly marveling at the immense capabilities of immortal cultivators. A mere strand of thought could survive in this world for a thousand years. How could mortals possibly imagine such a thing?
"Like this, another few hundred thousand years passed. During that time, I likewise discovered many people with mixed spirit roots, but still none who met our sect's requirements. About fifty years ago, a Gold Core Realm cultivator acquired the jade book. Once, while traveling, he encountered an extremely formidable enemy. Only by exhausting every divine ability he possessed did he escape pursuit, but by then his injuries were grievous, and the golden core inside him was almost
on the verge of collapsing. He barely managed to fly back to his cave abode, hoping to recuperate there, but died shortly after entering, his cultivation extinguished. Then, one day fourteen or fifteen years later, a lowly Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator stumbled upon the cave abode. With his paltry cultivation, he should never have discovered it. Even if he happened across it, he could not possibly have breached a Gold Core Realm cultivator's protective formation. But when the Gold Core Realm cultivator returned, he had only opened the formation's entrance and died before he could reactivate its defenses. Thus, this lowly cultivator managed to intrude. He obtained quite a few benefits there, including this book, naturally. Carried away by his success, he began searching every corner of the cave abode with even greater abandon. In the end, however, extreme joy gave way to sorrow: he accidentally triggered the protective formation. Fortunately, he was exceptionally quick-witted and fled the instant he sensed something amiss. Yet even with such decisiveness, a formation laid by a Gold Core Realm cultivator was more than he could withstand. As he escaped, an attack from the formation still struck him. By the time he emerged, he was barely breathing, and even his clothes and Storage Pouch had been blasted apart. Oh, as for a Storage Pouch, you can think of it as an immortal's storage device. It is a small pouch that uses immortal arts to hold things of varying sizes, depending on its grade. You can look into that later. In truth, perhaps this was simply that lowly cultivator's destined fate. The cultivation world is like that. Opportunity is often accompanied by danger, and danger often heralds death." By this point, the features of the old man's indistinct figure had begun to blur beyond recognition.
Li Yan looked at the old man's blurred face and figure and thought, Is this the dispersal of his Divine Thought he mentioned earlier?
"After that lowly cultivator's Storage Pouch was blasted apart, besides the book formed from the jade box, a jade slip and a paper booklet protected by immortal arts survived. However, the protective immortal arts on the paper booklet had been shattered and dispelled when the Storage Pouch burst. Before long, the lowly cultivator's soul returned to the underworld. And so I continued sleeping, waiting for the next 'fated person' to obtain this jade book. Several years later, one day, a mortal in black robes suddenly came here and retrieved the jade book, the jade slip, and the paper booklet, now stripped of its protective immortal arts, from beside that Foundation Establishment cultivator's withered bones." The old man paused, and a peculiar smile was faintly visible on his blurred face.
After a brief moment of thought, Li Yan said to the old man, "That man was my teacher, wasn't he?"
The old man's blurred figure nodded. "Correct. That man was your present 'teacher,' Strategist Ji." He deliberately stressed the word "teacher," with a hint of amusement.
Li Yan naturally heard the mockery in the old man's words. There was undoubtedly something wrong with this "teacher" of his. He could vaguely guess that it concerned him, but he still could not quite determine what the problem was.
"This 'teacher' of yours does not belong to some worldly martial sect called the 'Wood Shadow Sect.' That was merely a fictitious sect he invented offhand. In truth, he belongs to the 'Immortal-Seeking Lineage.'"
Although Li Yan could guess from the old man's expression that his "teacher" harbored some secret, hearing that even his sect
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was entirely fictitious, and that he was not even a member of the martial world, still caught him completely off guard. He could not help asking, "What is the 'Immortal-Seeking Lineage'? Do they search for immortals?"
"Heh, you are partly right. After those cultivators from the ancient Immortal Spirit Realm came to the Mortal Realm and established numerous cultivation lineages and sects, tens of thousands of years passed, and some people in the secular world gradually became dimly aware of these matters. They longed to enter those lineages or sects, hoping for an opportunity to learn immortal arts and obtain the path to longevity. At first, only scattered individuals ventured into the deep mountains in search of an immortal opportunity. They hoped to find immortals, win their favor, and be accepted as disciples. But the deep mountains teemed with demon beasts and ghosts. Often, before these people could find their immortal opportunity, they had already become food in a demon beast's belly or souls beneath a ghost's claws.
"Continuing like this was hardly the outcome these aspiring cultivators wanted. So they gradually gathered together and joined forces in their search for immortal opportunities. That way, they could look after one another when they encountered demon beasts or ghosts. Although the results improved considerably, casualties remained extremely high;
"Later, martial artists from the secular world began to join them. Some were hired, while others sought greater power and, upon hearing that immortals existed, resolutely joined their ranks. With their assistance, the chances of dying fell greatly. Thus, they searched mighty rivers and treacherous waters, painstakingly seeking that faint thread of immortal opportunity.
"Later, some among them who possessed spiritual roots truly found immortal sects, gained admission, and learned immortal arts. Others discovered the cultivation arts or cave abodes of deceased cultivators. If they happened to possess spiritual roots themselves, they likewise stepped onto the immortal path. This further stirred their confidence. They simply stopped concerning themselves with worldly affairs and trained diligently in martial arts together, so they could venture deeper into distant, unknown lands. They did not involve themselves in secular affairs or roam the martial world. Their hearts were set solely on pursuing immortal opportunities. Consequently, few ordinary people knew of them. Cultivators called them the 'Immortal-Seeking Lineage,' and Strategist Ji is an inheritor of that lineage."
After hearing all this, Li Yan thought, Why did this teacher of mine deceive me by claiming to belong to the 'Wood Shadow Sect'? That was something he still could not figure out.
"After Strategist Ji obtained the jade book, jade slip, and booklet, he was naturally delighted. But he did not know that this was also an enormous stroke of luck. The paper booklet and jade slip originally formed a single set of immortal arts called the 'Black Night Curtain Green Technique.' The paper booklet recorded only the introductory method for sensing the spiritual energy of heaven and earth, along with the formulas for the first three levels of the Qi Condensation Stage. The jade slip contained the formulas and cultivation methods for levels four through ten of the Qi Condensation Stage. It was presumably intended for beginners at the Qi Condensation Stage in some immortal sect. It was arranged this way because the Divine Sense of someone just beginning cultivation is too weak to leave the body. Only upon reaching the third level can it emerge, allowing them to open a jade slip. Thus, the first three levels are generally recorded in a paper booklet, which is then protected with the sect's immortal arts. Ordinary mortals naturally cannot open it. The protective immortal arts placed on some booklets are so strong that even Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators cannot open them. As for cultivators at the Foundation Establishment Realm or above who do possess the ability to break through those protections, they have no interest in doing so. They are already capable of founding sects of their own. Why would they care for such low-level introductory techniques? Besides, even if they wished to cultivate them, paper booklets generally contain only the first three levels. What use would those be?"
Before you continue