Chapter 192: Re-entering the Dragon Palace to See the Salamander, Nourishing the Spirit and Merging the Soul, Trapped in the Lotus Po

Some restricted areas had quite conspicuous markers noted on their edges.

But some restricted areas were completely blank.

It seemed to indicate that those who had entered before had not explored much, or were unable to explore due to other irresistible forces.

In this Simulation, she would take the initiative to head toward the locations of these restricted areas.

Three days of time flashed by in an instant.

Before departing, Ruan Xing finally received her jade slip, which was no different from the batch from three years ago.

She quietly went to ask Zhou Miaoyu again.

Zhou Miaoyu thought she was worried about having conflicts with other fellow disciples in the Secret Realm, so she comforted her: "The Lotus Pond Secret Realm is not open to outside cultivators; everyone who enters is a fellow disciple, and since we see each other all the time, how could we possibly fight to the death? Normal sparring does happen, but most fellow disciples, in order to save time to explore more places, will choose to split what they find equally."

She thought for a moment and added: "You look young, and you haven't been in the Sect much, so you aren't very familiar with the others. If you run into someone difficult to talk to, just take a step back. Those with big tempers all have elders in the Sect to rely on; it's best not to provoke them, otherwise, it will be very troublesome."

After thanking Zhou Miaoyu for her earnest guidance, Ruan Xing nodded thoughtfully.

The place she was going to was a restricted area, so she figured she shouldn't encounter anyone else.

After successfully entering the Secret Realm, Ruan Xing's landing spot was different from Zhou Miaoyu's. She pushed aside the lotus leaves in front of her, and the cold moon in the sky was reflected in the icy water, its reflection shattered into pieces by Ruan Xing's swimming movements.

After summoning the Shuttle Spirit Boat, Ruan Xing sat at the bow, her Divine Sense extending outward, and within a moment, she had scanned the area within a few miles.

Perhaps the other disciples had already dived to the bottom of the water, as she didn't see a single person.

However, she did find the towering stone peak in the middle of the lotus pond.

This was indeed good news; she could pinpoint her location on the map.

Taking a look at the map, there were not many restricted areas, only five, and the one closest to the stone peak happened to be in her direction, not far away.

Turning the boat around, Ruan Xing controlled the Shuttle Spirit Boat to speed toward that direction, arriving in just a few minutes.

Stowing the Shuttle Spirit Boat into her Storage Bag, Ruan Xing applied a Water Avoidance Talisman and plunged headfirst into the water.

The icy pool water pressed against her skin through the thin film formed by the Water Avoidance Talisman, a refreshing chill that seeped into her heart.

But it was fine; her Spiritual Power was naturally inclined toward the yin-cold.

Recalling the location on the map once more, Ruan Xing swam toward the deeper parts.

There were many messy things underwater, including various corals whose names Ruan Xing didn't know and strangely colored rocks, with clumps of ink-colored water weeds dancing with the current on top of them. Some fish and shrimp swam past Ruan Xing, bumping straight into her as if they couldn't see her at all.

These were not Monster Beasts, but ordinary fish. The Secret Realm was filled with abundant Spirit Qi; perhaps after growing for another ten or twenty years in the Secret Realm, they might be lucky enough to awaken their intelligence.

This place was one that had been marked on the map.

The marker written on it was a section of a giant, unknown creature's spine, half-buried in the mud and sand at the bottom. A certain senior brother who had encountered this restricted area left a painful warning on the marker: if one accidentally entered the restricted area, one could only step on the exposed white spine; one could not step anywhere else, otherwise, one would sink deeply into the mud and sand, unable to move at all.

He had lost both his shoes in the mud like that back then, sitting on the spine waiting for the Secret Realm to end so he could leave.

In this Secret Realm, there was nothing special other than the giant creature's spine and the mud with extremely strong suction.

Ruan Xing's gaze shifted over; she had already seen the giant white spine.

With a gentle stroke of her arms, her body moved toward the spine. As soon as she entered the range of the spine, Ruan Xing felt her body sink, and swimming became much more difficult and strenuous.

It was as if... the gravity here was dozens of times greater than in other places.

Her body instinctively mobilized Spiritual Power to resist this gravity, but the more she resisted, the more excited the force seemed to become. Helpless, she had to slowly descend and step onto the white spine.

The entire spine was two or three hundred meters long, the bones solid and firm; stepping on it, there was no swaying at all. The graceful arc continued all the way down, and even the joints showed no signs of fragility.

She walked along the spine for a while and roughly understood the scope of this restricted area.

It was about seven or eight hundred square meters.

About the size of a small playground.

The whole place was clear at a glance, and indeed there were no items containing Spirit Qi.

However, sometimes the absence of Spirit Qi was even stranger. The entire lotus pond was filled with Spirit Qi, and the little fish swimming around even had traces of Spirit Qi on them, with hopes of becoming Monster Beasts in a few years. Why was there nothing near this giant beast's spine? She boldly wanted to try what the senior brother who wrote the warning had experienced, so she slowly placed her feet onto the mud.

The ground, soft as cream, caused her feet to sink in.

She pulled upward with force, but she sank even deeper.

Ruan Xing held onto a protruding bone under the spine and pulled her feet out, leaving her shoes in the mud, and couldn't help but frown.

This kind of ground-sinking force... it inexplicably felt familiar. It didn't seem like some kind of Magic Art, nor did it seem like a mechanism or Dharma Artifact; there were no traces of Spiritual Power.

It was, rather, like her Divine Ability of unknown origin.

But the two were definitely not the same thing, just somewhat similar, because Ruan Xing had no way to use her Divine Ability to make such a large area of mud produce a sinking force.

With a light grasp of her fingers, she tried to retrieve her shoes using her Divine Ability, and without encountering the slightest obstruction, the pair of shoes returned to her hands.

Even stranger.

Ruan Xing frowned and thought for a moment. Staying on top wouldn't yield any gains; at most, she would be like that fellow disciple who was once trapped here, waiting until the Secret Realm ended to leave.

Deciding to go all the way, she put on her shoes, lay down, and sank into the mud.

As she slowly sank, the mud covered her face.

Holding her breath, Ruan Xing felt her entire body being squeezed downward by the mud.

As a Nascent Soul Stage cultivator, she would be fine even if she didn't breathe for days and nights, not to mention that this was in a Simulation, so she was even less afraid of encountering any danger.

The squeezing force grew stronger and stronger. Ruan Xing felt her body being kneaded like plasticine. The Spiritual Power in her dantian couldn't help but become restless. Out of an instinctive urge for self-preservation, a layer of Spiritual Power formed on the surface of her body, but it seemed to have no effect on this force; the Spiritual Power shield was soft within the invisible giant hands of that power.

The Nascent Soul infant in her dantian began to tremble.

The degree of fusion between her Divine Sense and Divine Soul, which had long lacked progress, deepened by a sliver.

Ruan Xing was stunned for a moment, and then ecstatic!

What she worried about most was that her Divine Soul could not fuse, making it impossible to break through to the Spirit Severing stage.

Not having a cultivation method was a minor issue; at least she had a goal and direction to strive for. But if her Divine Soul couldn't fuse, she was helpless; she had absolutely no idea what method to use.

She didn't know if it was because she was lucky or what, but in the Lotus Pond Secret Realm, she had successfully found the clue she wanted once again.

The squeezing force continued. Ruan Xing no longer resisted, but instead complied with this power, recalling the memories left to her by Guangyou Xianjun in her mind, and began to practice the Nourishing Spirit Record. Ever since reaching the Nascent Soul Stage, the Divine Sense in her Soul Sea had become incomparably vast.

The dense web it formed when spread out could cover a radius of two or three miles.

At this moment, these wisps of Divine Sense, as if they had grown tiny tentacles, burrowed into the body of the Nascent Soul infant within the dantian.

The Nascent Soul infant went from trembling and being passively fused at the beginning, to later actively opening its tiny hands to grab the Divine Sense around it, impatiently drawing it into its own body.

The Divine Sense formed dense, spiderweb-like connections inside and around the Nascent Soul.

The Nascent Soul infant, originally a mix of milky white and icy blue, had its somewhat illusory body filled in bit by bit by the Divine Sense, becoming solid.

As if her soul had flown into the sky, enjoying supreme pleasure, Ruan Xing let out a comfortable sigh; the cold, sticky silt squeezing her body no longer made her feel uncomfortable.

It seemed a 'pop' sound came to her ears—

The entire world seemed to grow distant.

It was as if she had broken free from some kind of shackle.

Ruan Xing gently opened her eyes and looked around her in utter astonishment.

Underneath a dense spiderweb, barely visible tentacles clung tightly to her body, then rapidly merged into her milky white and icy blue body.

Her soul had entered the Nascent Soul!

Then what about her physical body?

Ruan Xing was startled, but immediately felt the presence of her physical body, and let out a slight sigh of relief.

It was just that due to the pressure of the external force, her soul had temporarily entered the Nascent Soul, experiencing the feeling of Divine Soul fusion in advance.

This gave her a deeper understanding of certain insights in the Record of Nourishing the Spirit.

This was a rare opportunity; Ruan Xing stretched out her tiny hands to grab those wisps of Divine Sense, beginning to absorb and contain them hungrily, while continuously strengthening her Divine Soul according to the cultivation method in the Record of Nourishing the Spirit.

At this rate, with at most three more months of cultivation, she would be able to completely fuse her Divine Soul and have the basic conditions to advance to Spirit Severing! She did not know how long she had been cultivating.

When Ruan Xing woke up again, she had already left that patch of silt.

The effect of the Water Avoidance Talisman on her body had long since vanished, yet she was not stained with even a speck of dirt.

She applied another Water Avoidance Talisman to herself, and only then did she look up to examine this strange new place.

All around were shimmering glazed products, light and colorful veils danced gently in the water current, and the layers of jade walls seemed both real and illusory.

She stood up; the place where she had just been lying was a giant clam shell, and as she left, the pale pink clam shell slowly closed.

"Where is this place again?"

Ruan Xing was full of confusion; the Nascent Soul infant in her dantian lay there, chubby and round, and the progress of the Divine Sense fusion had already reached half.

However, having lost the pressure of that strange mud and sand, her speed of fusing the Divine Soul slowed down again.

Walking cautiously outward for about a few dozen meters, she arrived at what looked like a door; outside was a thick dragon pillar, and the four-clawed dragon carved upon it was lifelike, its eyes even seeming to follow her movements as it watched her.

And outside, it was like a place resembling an undersea canyon.

"I have been here before," Ruan Xing muttered to herself, "This is where I got the second key."

Only at that time, she had sensed a dangerous aura within the Dragon Palace that seemed to come from a Monster Beast, so she had left after just taking the key, without entering the Dragon Palace to take a closer look.

But now, that aura had disappeared.

She had walked around the Dragon Palace openly like this, yet she did not see another creature capable of communication.

Looking around, Ruan Xing intended to return to the interior of the Dragon Palace to find if there were any other clues, when she suddenly stopped in her tracks.

Her gaze turned to the dragon pillar at the entrance.

The four-clawed glazed dragon on it... seemed to have changed its posture.

This discovery made Ruan Xing's hair stand on end; she abruptly took a step back, flipped her wrist, and shouted: "A Jiao!"

"Coming!" Cai Jiao's lively voice rang out.

A slender sword like white jade appeared abruptly in her hand, pointing at the dragon pillar.

The eyes of the four-clawed glazed dragon flashed, a faint sigh reached her ears, and it slithered down from the dragon pillar it had been coiled around.

Its slender body was only a little over a meter long, its four claws had sharp tips, and the scales on its body shone brilliantly.

Her gaze moved constantly over the body of the four-clawed glazed dragon, and Ruan Xing put away the shock in her eyes, "There is actually a dragon..."

The Monster Beasts of this world were not strong, and they had not even developed into powerful Great Monsters; the idea that Great Monsters at the Transformation stage could turn into human form was something passed down from ancient times. In reality, apart from being able to bully bottom-tier mortals and Cultivators, Monster Beasts were mostly used as tools to hone disciples, or as delicacies served on the dining table; occasionally, those with good luck would become transportation tools or kept as pets.

If there really were legendary creatures like dragons in this world, how could the status of Monster Beasts be so pathetic?

Moreover, Ruan Xing could not sense any particularly powerful or dangerous scent on the four-clawed glazed dragon.

"I am not a dragon," the four-clawed glazed dragon opened its mouth and said faintly, "I am a salamander."

Ruan Xing was even more shocked.

This Monster Beast, ah no, this dragon could actually speak! It clearly had not established a mental link with her, nor had it reached the Transformation stage!

A look of helplessness flashed in the salamander's glazed eyes, "Salamander is my form in the Record of Nourishing the Spirit; to be more accurate, I should be a Consciousness Worm."

It's just a Simulation anyway, Ruan Xing quietly comforted herself in her heart.

Besides, having experienced the information explosion of modern society, she could see no matter how explosive a creature was in various AI videos, so even though she was surprised, she still managed to steady her mind and calm down.

Looking closely, the salamander's head was indeed very different from the dragon in the myths she knew.

The salamander's head was somewhat oval-shaped, there were no dragon horns on top of its head, and its mouth also looked blunt.

Ruan Xing steadied herself and asked, "What is a Consciousness Worm?"

Since the salamander had shown a friendly and kind side and was willing to communicate with her, having a good chat would not be a bad idea.

After all, she had too many questions in her heart right now waiting for the salamander to explain and answer.

"This has to start from a long time ago..." the salamander looked at Ruan Xing and said softly.

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