The ball of golden light then abruptly exploded amid a dull thump, and the silver runes it had released flew toward all parts of the mountain.
Silver light flashed, and the runes vanished into the mountain face before rapidly traversing through the belly of the mountain.
Han Li hovered patiently in mid-air in a completely expressionless manner.
Around 10 minutes later, the disc down below suddenly emitted a ringing sound, following which it began to glow with scintillating golden light.
Han Li raised an eyebrow upon seeing this before raising a hand, and the disc shuddered before flying upward, appearing over his palm in the blink of an eye.
Han Li glanced at the disc to find that a ball of piercing light had appeared over its surface.
Azure light then flashed from his body as he immediately flew toward the mountain down below, then vanished into it before flying through the belly of the mountain at an incredible speed.
Moments later, light appeared up ahead, and a giant cave emerged down below. There was a silver head-sized ball of light that was hovering at the center of the cave in a completely stationary manner, and it had been formed by the silver runes that had been released by the golden disc earlier.
The azure light faded, and Han Li appeared within the cave. He quickly looked around to discover that there were several winding passageways connected to this cave, and his expression changed slightly before he strode toward one of the passageways.
The inside of the passageway was completely devoid of light, so much so that he couldn't even see his own fingers. However, he then raised a hand, and several white crystals flew out of his sleeve before revolving around his head, illuminating the passageway so that it was as bright as day.
After only making his way through a small section of the passageway, Han Li released hsi spiritual sense toward the bumpy surface of the stone walls around him.
Moments later, his footsteps faltered, and he opened his mouth again to expel a burst of azure light onto the stone wall.
The stone wall was sliced apart like tofu by the sharp streak of sword Qi, and a cave with a diameter of several feet was quickly carved into the stone wall.
"Clang!"
A strange sound rang out from within the dark cave, and it was particularly audible in this narrow passageway.
A hint of elation appeared on Han Li's face upon hearing this sound, and he made a hand seal before pointing into the cave.
A small azure sword shot forth, puncturing through an unknown piece of purplish-black ore.
"This really is the place. There's quite a bit of this ore here; it'll take me a few days if I want to excavate all of it." Han Li raised his hand to withdraw the flying sword before catching the piece of ore in his hand and giving it a thorough inspection.
He naturally wasn't going to remain here and mine the ore himself. He swept a hand over his storage bracelet, and several balls of spiritual light shot forth before revealing themselves to be several puppets of different sizes and forms.
These puppets were all ones that he had refined in the human world, so they were of an extremely low caliber, but they were more than capable of acting as miners.
Han Li then patted the top of his own head to release his second Nascent Soul to supervise the puppets, then unleashed an earth movement technique to rise up to the summit of the mountain.
At this moment, Qu'er was also flying over to the mountain, and she quickly flew over to him before handing him a storage bracelet that contained tens of thousands of Flying Rainbow Fish demon cores.
Han Li inspected the contents of the storage bracelet and was very pleased with what he saw. Thus, he extended some words of praise toward Qu'er before carefully stowing the storage bracelet away.
Qu'er hesitated momentarily before suddenly asking, "Master, I can sense that there seem to be a lot of spirit medicines on this island; should I go and pick them?"
"Spirit medicines? You're a spirit medicine yourself, so I'm sure your instincts are correct. Alright, there aren't any powerful beasts in this place, and we have enough time anyway, so you can go and collect the spirit medicines if you'd like."Han Li was rather taken aback to hear this, but after a brief moment of contemplation, he allowed Qu'er to do as she pleased.
"Thank you, Master. I'll be going now." The little girl departed in an elated manner, flying toward the other lush mountain as a ball of white light.
Han Li looked on with a smile for a moment before finding a giant rock nearby to take a seat on.
He then swept a sleeve through the air, and a dozen or so formation flags of different colors short forth before vanishing into the surrounding air after just a few flashes.
A five-colored light barrier appeared to encapsulate the entire mountain peak, but it then abruptly vanished in a flash.
From a distance, it didn't seem as if anything in the surrounding area had changed, but Han Li had vanished from sight.
After setting up the restriction, he made a hand seal, and bright golden light erupted from his body, following which a golden figure appeared behind him.
It was none other than the Provenance Projection.
Han Li pointed a finger at the projection, and purple runes immediately flashed over its body, following which it manifested into a golden body that stood in a stationary manner in front of him.
Han Li narrowed his eyes slightly and inspected the golden body for a long while before suddenly waving a hand toward it.
One of the three heads of the golden body opened its mouth to expel a silver ball of light, within which was the silver ruler that belonged to the deceased golden-horned young man.
This treasure wasn't a Profound Heavenly Treasure, but it had also displayed extraordinary powers and couldn't be looked down on. It was most likely a Divine Spirit Treasure.
However, Han Li hadn't yet had a chance to confirm this, which was why he was bringing it out now for closer inspection.
The silver ruler was drawn into his grasp in a flash, and he stroked the surface of the ruler with his fingers while slowly closing his eyes to seep his spiritual sense into it.
His expression remained placid, and after an indeterminate period of time, he abruptly opened his eyes.
This Chaotic Origin Ruler was indeed a Divine Spirit Treasure, and all he had to do to be able to control this treasure was to cultivate the Artifact Imprint Technique recorded within the treasure.
Azure light flashed from his hand as he injected bursts of pure spiritual power into the ruler, and in the next instant, it let loose a long cry before shuddering as it abruptly expelled a silver light barrier.
Rows of ancient text appeared on the light barrier, and Han Li's eyes flashed as he memorized the Artifact Imprint Technique of the Chaotic Origin Ruler, then flicked his wrist, and the treasure vanished in a flash along with the light barrier.
He then withdrew his golden body as well before making a hand seal and began to cultivate the Chaotic Origin Ruler's Artifact Imprint Technique.
Time passed by in the flash, and three days flew by in the blink of an eye.
With Han Li's current cultivation base at the pinnacle of the Spatial Tempering Stage, it naturally didn't require as much time for him to refine this ruler as it did for the Heavenvoid Cauldron.
Within the short span of three days, he successfully cultivated the treasure's Artifact Imprint Technique before fusing it into his own body.
During this time, the puppets down below had also almost finished mining the unknown ore in the mountain, and he would complete his mission after about another day.
Qu'er had also collected many spirit medicines from the island during this time, some of which were extremely rare in the Spirit Realm, this was quite a pleasant surprise.
After exploring for a day or two without encountering any hazards, Qu'er had become a lot braver and had begun collecting some of the extremely obscure spirit medicines growing on the nearby lakebed.
Han Li had been at a critical juncture in his cultivation of the Artifact Imprint Technique at the time, so he had only extended some words of caution toward her via voice transmission before letting her go.
However, had naturally left a wisp of his spiritual sense on her in case any mishaps were to occur.
As it turned out, his cautionary measures were warranted, and around half a day after he had finished cultivating the Artifact Imprint Technique, he suddenly sensed something while he was meditating, and a cold expression appeared on his face.
All of a sudden, he flew out of the restriction as a streak of azure light before hurtling toward a certain direction, vanishing into the distance after just a few flashes.
Meanwhile, there were three streaks of light flying through the air in an extremely panicked manner several hundred kilometers away from the island.
One of them was a ball of white light that contained a small figure; it was none other than Qu'er.
Several kilometers behind them were four strange triangular battle carriages that were giving chase in hot pursuit.
Each carriage was only several tens of feet in size, and their surfaces were riddled with patches of green rust. The spiritual light emanating from them was also quite dim, and they even seemed to be somewhat damaged. However, they were extraordinarily fast and could cover a distance of several hundred feet with each and every flash.
Qu'er was quite adept in movement techniques, but she was slowly being chased down.
As for the other two people with her, they were even faster and could just barely maintain the distance between themselves and the flying carriages.
"Kukuku, Fellow Daoist Yue, you've already expended far too much energy during the last battle; how far do you think you'll be able to go even if you burn your latent potential like this? If you know what's good for you, then you'll hand over the Nineflame Herb you have, and I can grant you a painless death." A coarse and unpleasant male voice rang out from within one of the flying carriages, and the voice was tinged with a hint of impatience.
"Hmph, I'd sooner destroy this spirit herb than hand it over to you!" A cold female voice sounded in response from a streak of blue light that was flying up ahead.
"Don't waste your time talking to them, Fairy Yue. They immediately stabbed us in the back after we secure that treasure; we can't place our trust in them." The enraged voice of an elderly man rang out from within a streak of grey light.
"Don't worry, Fellow Daoist Xu; it would be downright pitiful if I were to trust them again after what they did," the woman replied.
Almost at the exact same moment, she transmitted her voice to the elderly man. "Fellow Daoist Xu, are you sure this is the right way? We won't be able to last much longer like this."
"It should be correct. The treasure tells me that there should be a Heavenly Cloud being nearby in this direction. That little girl behind us has a rather strange aura; she's most likely a spirit beast that was brought here by that Heavenly Cloud being. They've planted tracking marks on us, so we have no choice but to make this final gamble," the elderly man replied something else in a loud voice while transmitting his voice to the woman as his actual response.
The woman heaved a faint sigh upon hearing this and fell silent as she flew on ahead as quickly as she could.
