Imperial Cultivation

Chapter 1562: Chapter 1558: Hard to Find

Chu Zhiyuan chuckled, "This green stone is useful in the early stages, but it’s not much use when one has reached Venerable Perfection."

"That’s already extremely impressive," Shen Hanyue marveled, "Qingyu is lucky. If we had this, our progress would be much faster."

Xiao Ruoling shot her a glance.

Their cultivation speed is already astonishing, frightening everyone at Profound Yin Palace.

If it weren’t for Chu Zhiyuan’s precedent, they would have stirred the entire world.

Zhou Qingyu looked at the Jade Bed, "Master, I fear I might not last here."

Chu Zhiyuan said, "Practicing on it will be better; it will also temper your spirit."

Zhou Qingyu practicing on this green stone was like standing on ice, even colder than ice.

In such a situation, one must desperately operate to counteract, while also calming one’s mind, unaffected by the cold.

This helps her accelerate her cultivation, temper her spiritual power, and purify her spiritual strength.

It will greatly benefit her future cultivation.

Moreover, it can improve her aptitude and continuously enhance her qualities.

Thereby achieving three benefits in one, with endless advantages.

With the aid of this green stone, her progress will be faster than seen in the Donghuan Saint Technique, reaching Venerable within a year.

Chu Zhiyuan bid them farewell and returned to the lakefront, holding one hand with the Spring Sun Sword, the other pressed on the lake surface.

The lake water quickly poured into the Jade Sea and Sky.

The lake surface slowly descended, though the lake had many springs, constantly replenishing as water flowed away, causing the descent to be very slow.

An hour later, the lake surface had only dropped by a foot, leaving Chu Zhiyuan amazed.

He hadn’t expected the lake to replenish so rapidly; at this rate, it seemed impossible to drain the lake dry even over several days and nights.

However, he gradually perceived a change in the lake water, as the newly entered water contained less of the strange energy.

Thus, he concluded that this strange energy did not originate from the lake water but from the array.

Using the Divine Eye, he saw the array’s truth and falsehood.

Buried under the lake bottom were four pieces of strange stone forming an array.

This array absorbs surrounding energy, converting it into a special force.

The person who threw these four strange stones was a middle-aged man from the Divine Race.

Unfortunately, the Divine Eye could not track this Divine Race middle-aged man further to understand him fully.

It was only known that after dropping these four stones, he never appeared again.

Reasoning through time, it was deduced the Divine Race had all left, hence he didn’t return.

It was challenging to determine the purpose and function of the array formed by these four stones.

What could be determined was its strange energy could consolidate one’s Divine Eye.

If he could acquire this energy, the Divine Eye could operate smoothly without relying on Abyssal Water or lake water, making it more convenient.

He closed his eyes and used the Divine Eye to start locating these four stones.

Once the array formed, the stones and the lake water became inseparable, making it difficult for even the Divine Eye to find their essence.

The Divine Eye, seeing only the past, could prevent seeing the true faces of these four stones.

Without the Divine Eye, knowing there’s an array would still leave him helpless.

Whether using his eyes, Super Sense, or Divine Eye, he couldn’t find these four stones.

The force transformed by these four stones was likely just what his Divine Eye needed most.

If he could include these four stones into the Jade Sea and Sky, surely his Divine Eye could be utilized freely.

Perhaps it could even enhance the Divine Eye.

Thinking of this, he settled down and meticulously began his search.

The vast lake, with a diameter of over two hundred meters, still yielded no results through Divine Eye scanning.

After a half-day of searching, he shook his head helplessly.

Time and again, as if sieving, the Divine Eye scanned every inch of the lakebed multiple times.

Yet he still couldn’t locate those four strange stones.

Not to mention four pieces, he couldn’t even find one.

He stood by the lake, looking dignified with helplessness.

This approach yielding the same results even if he searched for several days and nights.

At this thought, he gritted his teeth, closed his eyes, and swung the Spring Sun Sword.

One by one, invisible sword auras plunged into the lake water, like swimming fish.

He unleashed seventy-two sword auras in one breath.

The seventy-two sword auras were his current limit of spiritual power manipulation; anything beyond this would lack precision control and sensing, yielding no benefit.

With seventy-two sword auras, like seventy-two fish swimming through the lake, forming three rows advancing forward.

This time truly like a fishing net, leaving no place untouched.

Different from the Divine Eye, this time the sword auras performed direct mapping of his heart and spirit against the lake water, sensing its subtle changes.

The seventy-two sword auras continually transmitted these subtle changes into his mind.

His mind ran at high speed, processing overwhelming information.

Spiritual power depleted like a flood breaking loose.

If his current spiritual power weren’t strong, if his Heavenly Yuan Technique Realm weren’t profound, even with clone assistance, he wouldn’t endure.

The Inner Universe kept injecting spiritual power, while clones continued providing spiritual support, maintaining his mind’s rapid operation, analyzing information transmitted by the seventy-two sword auras.

He left no slight change undiscovered; at any anomaly, the seventy-two sword auras would turn around, retracing their path.

Time slowly passed.

His complexion grew more pallid.

Even though his Inner Universe constantly replenished him, and the two clones injected spiritual essence continually.

The two clones focused on performing Nine Techniques of Spirit Abyss to restore spiritual power swiftly.

Yet, the spiritual replenishment remained insufficient to support him for long.

He had reached his limit.

At this moment, he had searched only two-thirds of the lake.

With one-third left, he knew no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t hold out until the end.

Yet a single surrender would waste all prior efforts.

Recommencing next time, further searches from here would be fruitless.

The array’s complexity merged the stones and lake water seamlessly, the lake was flowing rather than stationary.

So these four stones certainly wouldn’t remain fixed in place; they would change with the flow of the lake.

Abandoning now would mean starting anew, going through it all again.

He continued for another quarter of an hour, halting just when only one-fourth of the lake remained.

Without spiritual support, the seventy-two sword auras lost control and turned into straight lines, shooting forward.

At this moment, his face was as pale as a sheet of paper.

And then he vanished.

The New Cave Heaven remains an unknown domain, who knows what dangers lurk there.

He appeared in the Tongtian Hall.

Seeing Zhang Ji Yuan and Ning Dongge.

The two sat on their mats looking somber, speechless, heavy with tension.

Seeing him appear, both shook their heads and sighed.

Chu Zhiyuan smiled, "What troubles my two senior brothers? Did things not go well over there? Did he get away?"

"That fellow is truly cunning," Zhang Ji Yuan snorted, "It seemed he sensed us tracking and only stayed there cultivating, not venturing anywhere."

Chu Zhiyuan asked, "He hasn’t committed any wrong?"

"No," Zhang Ji Yuan shook his head.

Ning Dongge added, "If he continues like this, we truly have no means to act against him."

If Ding Shaojun continuously and honestly engages in closed cultivation without any wrongdoing, they are left without a choice.

If Ding Shaojun is as Chu Zhiyuan said, their intervention could at least cripple his cultivation, or might outright kill him.

A matter of life and death demands caution.

Chu Zhiyuan lightly nodded.

The saying goes, hearing about something can’t compare to seeing it; without seeing him commit evil or capturing solid evidence, by his two senior brothers’ moral standards, action can’t be directly taken.

Zhang Ji Yuan said, "Junior brother, any ideas?"

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