Chapter 512: Destination
With their soul awarenesses that were powerful enough to reach the depths of the earth, Dong Tuodi and Qin Yi conducted a thorough search of this floating continent, but failed to find anything noteworthy.
Eventually, everyone from the Dong Clan and the Water Moon Chamber of Commerce gave up.
The five forces from the Realm of a Hundred Battles regathered, and after a short discussion, they decided to leave.
One Rainbow Lightning after another sped away from the floating continent, along with Pei Qiqi’s Lightning Shuttle and other air-transportation spiritual tools.
Once again, Nie Tian boarded Pei Qiqi’s Lightning Shuttle.
As the Lightning Shuttle sped through the void following the group from the Realm of a Hundred Battles, Pei Qiqi reminded Nie Tian in a low voice, “Be careful of that Qin Yan.”
Face filled with confusion, Nie Tian turned to look at her.
“After you left with Dong Li, Qin Yan intentionally provoked Gu Haofeng to make him angry at you,” Pei Qiqi explained.
Nie Tian instantly understood the reason why Gu Haofeng had suddenly appeared when he and Dong Li had been talking in private.
His eyebrows furrowed as he stuck his head out of the Lightning Shuttle to look at the distant Qin Yan, who was traveling with other members of the Water Moon Chamber of Commerce.
Over the following days, they followed the people from the Realm of a Hundred Battles, who seemed to be traveling without a destination, yet repeatedly changed direction.
Nie Tian practiced cultivation day and night. With the help of his fire-attributed materials, he refined his vortex of flame power and formed liquidized flame power.
Time flew. Two months passed…
During this period of time, Nie Tian finished a few rounds of refinement of his vortex of flame power, and filled the crimson lake of liquidized flame power at the bottom of his vortex of flame power to the brim.
He could already feel the magical feeling that he was ready for his next breakthrough.
Every time he made a breakthrough in his cultivation, he had to accumulate power over a long period of time. Not only would he need to expand and refine his vortex of spiritual power, but he also needed to cultivate his fire power, wood power, and star power to the breakthrough point.
Only in this way would he be able to eventually make the breakthrough when he came to the right enlightenment and entered the right state of mind.
In his senses, after his recent adventures, his cultivation of his spiritual sea had already reached the breakthrough point, and he already had the magical feeling of being ready for his next breakthrough. However, something seemed to be missing.
As he recalled his former breakthroughs, he pondered whether it was his lack of refinement of his body, or if he wasn’t in the right state of mind.
Due to the unique features of his body, ever since he had awakened the Life Drain bloodline talent, every time he had absorbed flesh power from spirit beast meat, every wisp of it had been drawn to his heart and devoured by the green aura.
Because of this, he had been unable to refine his own body with flesh power.
It seemed that only when the green aura was fed with enough flesh power and lay dormant again would he be able to refine his body with more flesh power.
“From the look of it, I need to satisfy that green aura first.” With this thought in mind, he consumed the spirit beast meat Dong Li had given him over the following days.
Since Pei Qiqi was by his side the whole time, he didn’t absorb flesh power from the spirit beast meat with Life Drain.
Instead, he absorbed it through the conventional way of eating.
Time flew. Two more weeks passed.
During this time, the group from the Realm of a Hundred Battles had encountered more floating continents and boulders, yet they failed to find anything noteworthy on any of them.
This day, Cao Zhaoji, who traveled at the forefront of the formation, informed everyone in a loud voice as he changed directions again.
Standing in the Lightning Shuttle, which kept a certain distance from the main group, Pei Qiqi heard Cao Zhaoji’s call and adjusted her direction accordingly.
At that moment, her eyes suddenly lit up.
“Cao Zhaoji is quite good. I can’t believe he’s found this place with such accuracy.” Pei Qiqi muttered in a low voice.
Nie Tian, who was stuffing spirit beast meat down his throat, turned to look at her, confusion filling his face. “What place?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Pei Qiqi said with an expressionless face.
Nie Tian took a deep look at her as he nodded slowly, and then resumed gorging himself again.
Even though he didn’t ask her, he had a feeling that Pei Qiqi must have learned about this place she referred to from the profound spatial energy she had previously received from that floating volcano.
Recently, he could constantly feel Pei Qiqi thrumming with strong spatial fluctuations, from which he could tell that she had been trying to derive enlightenment from the tiny spatial blades inside of her.
From the look of it, she had already refined most of the spatial blades, and come to some new knowledge or insights.
The two of them both had their own secrets. Since Pei Qiqi didn’t ask him what he had obtained from the seventy-two tree branches, he felt it wasn’t his place to ask her what she had learned from those spatial blades.
After a moment of silence, Pei Qiqi said, “It won’t be long before I can break through into the late Greater Heaven stage. When the time comes, I’ll find a secluded location to make my breakthrough, so I might be gone for a period of time.”
Nie Tian went blank briefly before asking, “Don’t you want me to protect you during the process?”
Pei Qiqi shook her head decisively. “There’s no need for that. I don’t think it’ll be wise to have anyone by my side when I make the breakthrough.”
Nie Tian suspected that she was worried that her secrets might be exposed while she tried to make her breakthrough. Therefore, she refused his offer so that he wouldn’t discover them.
“If I’m gone for too long, you don’t need to wait for me,” Pei Qiqi added. “You can just leave with Dong Li and the others.”
A confused expression spread on Nie Tian’s face as he said, “I don’t understand why.”
“I don’t have absolute confidence that I’ll be able to make the breakthrough smoothly, and I don’t know how long it will take.” After a moment of hesitation, she continued, “It was a wise decision for you to join the group from the Realm of a Hundred Battles. But I… I have my own plans. When we get to the place, I’ll leave the group to find something by myself. Since you don’t practice spatial power, you won’t be able to go with me.”
Nie Tian stared blankly at her for a while before asking, “Is this your farewell to me?”
With a soft sigh, Pei Qiqi said, “It will benefit us both if I leave temporarily. I’ll come find you when I’m finished.”
Since Nie Tian didn’t know what her plans were, and she didn’t seem to want to talk about it, he decided to let it go.
Hence, both of them fell silent.
A few days later, the group from the Realm of a Hundred Battles finally stopped traveling at full speed and came to a stop.
“This is it,” Pei Qiqi muttered softly.
Nie Tian, who was sitting in the lotus position, sprang to his feet, rushed to the edge of the Lightning Shuttle, and gazed into the distance with rapt attention.
Directly ahead of them was a seemingly endless band that was shaped in a swirl. At first glance, it looked like a huge, colorful vortex.
Inside the wide, multicolored band floated landmasses, boulders, outsiders’ remains, dilapidated ancient starships of different outsider races, and many other odd-looking objects.
All of them were slowly floating and subsiding in the band towards the bottom.
“It looks just like a giant vortex of spiritual power within our spiritual seas,” Nie Tian said, deeply amazed. “It’s just so many times larger.”
“We’re finally here,” Pei Qiqi said in a soft voice.
“What is that?” Qian Xin from the Pill Pavilion Sect asked, shock filling her eyes.
Qin Yan was also deeply amazed. “Why does it look like a giant vortex of spiritual power? Look! There are so many boulders, outsider’s corpses, and broken ancient starships! All of them seem to be moving under the influence of some force and slowly swirling down towards the bottom of the vortex. I wonder what’s at the bottom of the vortex!”
From the look of it, many of those from the Realm of a Hundred Battles had no idea what they were looking at either.
Nie Tian observed closely, and discovered that Dong Tuodi, Qin Yi, Gu Yue, Zhong Pu, and Cao Zhaoji, these late Profound realm experts, were the only ones who didn’t say a word.
They seemed to be the only ones who knew the secrets of this place.
While people marveled at the splendid scene before them, Nie Tian suddenly sensed wisps of awareness that didn’t belong to their group coming from the colorful band that looked like a giant vortex.
At the same time, he also started to sense a gravitational force from them.
It appeared that the closer they were to the band, the stronger the gravitational force they would feel.
At that moment, Dong Tuodi suddenly let out a cold harrumph. Eyes fixed on a floating landmass in the swirling vortex, he exclaimed, “People from the Poison Sect!”
“I can’t believe they’re already here,” Cao Zhaoji said with a light smile. “I wonder, other than us and the people from the Spirit God Sect, who else is coming.”
“It won’t matter,” Zhong Pu said. “Our strength shouldn’t be any weaker than any of the other forces.”
Cao Zhaoji nodded slightly as he took a deep breath. His gaze swept across the Worldly realm and Greater Heaven stage juniors in their group as he said, “We’ll enter that vortex shortly. I’ve got a few things to remind you of though, so listen carefully.
“First of all, all of you who are at the Greater Heaven stage, don’t ever use your psychic awareness to scan your surroundings once you enter. Those who don’t possess soul power will be torn to shreds the moment they use their psychic power to examine their surroundings in there.
“Second of all, once you enter the vortex, go with the natural flow within those colorful rings. You’ll follow the swirling band as you slowly float towards the bottom of the vortex. Don’t ever try to go against the flow. Otherwise, the consequences will be catastrophic!
“Last of all, don’t use your air-transportation spiritual tools while you’re in there.
“All of you should only use the floating objects in there as places to support your feet, and let the natural flow carry you.”
Even though the juniors from the Realm of a Hundred Battles didn’t know the reason behind these requirements, they memorized every single one of them.
“You should listen to him and act by those rules,” Pei Qiqi reminded Nie Tian in a low voice. “Don’t do anything rashly.”
Nie Tian was taken aback. “You know he’s right!?”
“Yeah, so far, all the things he’s said are right,” Pei Qiqi answered.
Nie Tian grew increasingly curious.
He hadn’t acquired any images regarding this place from the formation of seventy-two tree branches, so he had no idea how this place came to form, or what he should know about it.
WHOOSH! WHOOSH!
While he was confused, another group of people suddenly arrived by the colorful vortex from another direction.
They were people from the Spirit God Sect and the Flame God Sect, among whom Nie Tian identified Yao Shou, Cheng Qian, and Lu Jianfan.
Upon noticing the group from the Realm of a Hundred Battles, Yao Shou went blank briefly before rapidly discovering Pei Qiqi in the group.
