Chapter 36

On a spiritual mountain towering into the clouds thousands of miles away from the Fuyun Mountain Range, the Xiaoyao Sect's General Affairs Elder, True Person Daoist Guangling, was closing his eyes and resting in the hall.

Before long, a gray-clad Foundation Establishment disciple walked quickly into the hall, holding a red message talisman paper in his hand. Seeing True Person Daoist Guangling, he hurriedly said:

"Master, Senior Brother Tian sent a sound talisman. They have already found that spiritual fruit tree in the Fuyun Mountain Range and are now bringing Junior Brother Li and the others back to the sect. At the speed of his Green Spirit Boat, I think they should be able to return to Mount Tongxuan in three or four days."

"Congratulations to Master for performing another great service for the sect. This time, finding a Five Elements fruit tree for the sect, if the Sect Master Uncle-Master finds out, he will definitely reward our General Affairs Hall."

True Person Daoist Guangling slowly opened his eyes and said with a smile: "Obtaining a Five Elements fruit tree, such a spiritual item that can increase the foundation of the sect, is naturally a blessing for the sect. Before the monster beast turmoil in the Northern Frontier, being able to cultivate one or two more Foundation Establishment cultivators for the sect can also add a little help to the sect."

True Person Daoist Guangling, dressed in black, looked not very old, as if he were only in his twenties or thirties. He narrowed his sharp eyes, nodded with a smile at the person reporting before him, and then gave an order with a calm expression.

"Tianyu, send a disciple to Qinghefang to notify Lu Yuanfeng that the Liu family on Mount Jingyuan in Qinghe County no longer needs to exist. Send all the cultivators to Mount Huoyan to mine the black iron ore vein."

"Master, the cultivators of the Liu family have all been sent to Mount Huoyan. How should the remaining mortals be handled? Should they be assigned to Qinghefang?"

True Person Daoist Guangling looked at the thoughtful disciple before him and smiled, saying: "Let Lu Yuanfeng handle it himself. If he is willing to accept them, assign them to Qinghefang. If he is unwilling, let the Huang family and nearby families accept them. The mistakes of cultivators should not involve the mortals below."

Lin Tianyu nodded and was just about to leave when he seemed to suddenly think of something and asked: "Master, we also know that this time it was the Liu family who organized the manpower to go to the Fuyun Mountain Range to hunt monsters, and it hasn't been determined that the Liu family definitely knew about the spiritual fruit tree. Should we invite the Liu family people over to ask clearly, so as not to wrong them?"

"No need. The one from the Liu family who reached Foundation Establishment a hundred years ago must have obtained the Water Spirit Fruit from here. A small Qi Refining family now dares to hide things under the sect's nose. This time, we must also spread the news to deter those dishonest families and let them know the consequences of being clever."

"But Master, that Qi Refining disciple who discovered the spiritual fruit tree—why does Master treat him with such courtesy? He has poor character and was willing to betray his own clan for his own interests."

True Person Daoist Guangling narrowed his eyes and stood up. He walked to the hall door and continued: "I knew you wouldn't understand. That's right, under the Questioning God Talisman that day, this person was indeed a selfish and self-interested person. However, the first thing he thought of was to offer this spiritual fruit tree to the sect, even if it meant betraying the interests of his own family. The sect must reward this kind of person, and also let the family cultivators below know that the sect is also their protector."

"I hold the position of Sect Master of the General Affairs Hall, managing hundreds of vassal families under the sect. Nowadays, more and more families below have forgotten the sect's protection of them. They only know the interests of their families and completely ignore the sect. There are quite a few who eat inside and out. If this continues for a long time, they will become more and more alienated from the sect. When the monster beast turmoil in the Northern Frontier comes, how can the sect rely on them?"

Lin Tianyu nodded blankly after hearing this. Although he was somewhat puzzled by his master's arrangements, he had never dared to oppose them.

At this time, Du Yucheng, standing on Tian Qinghu's Green Spirit Boat, did not know that when he went to the Xiaoyao Sect to report the news of the Water Spirit Fruit tree, he had long been thoroughly investigated by the Xiaoyao Sect cultivators using the Questioning God Talisman.

The Questioning God Talisman was a second-tier spirit talisman. When used on ordinary Qi Refining or even Foundation Establishment cultivators, it could fix the cultivator's mind in a short period, making the cultivator unable to lie and easily asking the questions they wanted to know. However, it was of no use to cultivators above the Foundation Establishment stage.

Although this spirit talisman was a second-tier spirit talisman and was worth a lot, costing over a hundred spirit stones each, in order to confirm the news of the Water Spirit Fruit tree, True Person Daoist Guangling still used it on Du Yucheng without hesitation. Before using the Questioning God Talisman, he even used the Soul-Drawing Technique on him in advance. To this day, Du Yucheng still didn't know that the Xiaoyao Sect had actually wasted a precious Questioning God Talisman on him.

True Person Daoist Guangling's cultivation was at the fourth layer of Jin Dan. Among the nine Jin Dan cultivators in the Xiaoyao Sect, his cultivation could only be considered average.

Don't look at his appearance as only being in his twenties or thirties; that was because he had taken youth-preserving elixirs early on. In fact, he had been cultivating for over three hundred years, which was not a small age among Jin Dan cultivators.

Jin Dan stage cultivators possessed a lifespan of five hundred years, and coupled with being able to take some third-tier life-extending spiritual items, they could live for another hundred years. Without other reasons affecting their lifespan, they could generally live to six hundred years old.

True Person Daoist Guangling's time for forming a core was relatively late. He attempted to form a core three times in succession and only successfully formed a Jin Dan by luck when he was nearly two hundred years old. He had been a Jin Dan for nearly two hundred years, but he was only at the fourth layer of Jin Dan. Within the Xiaoyao Sect, he was considered a Jin Dan cultivator whose potential was exhausted, which was why he was assigned by the Sect Master to the position of Elder of the General Affairs Hall, which had many miscellaneous matters.

However, True Person Daoist Guangling himself was not that desperate about his own path of cultivation. He often thought about performing meritorious service for the sect, exchanging for more merits, and wanting to accelerate his own cultivation progress.

Over the years, relying on the convenience of his position as the head of the General Affairs Hall, he had also gained quite a few benefits and exchanged for quite a few cultivation resources. It was just that his cultivation speed was really not fast, and whether he could cultivate to the late stage of Jin Dan before his lifespan was exhausted was hard to say, let alone impacting the Nascent Soul stage.

This time, for the sake of this Water Spirit Fruit tree, True Person Daoist Guangling could be considered to have done his best. If it weren't for the many sect affairs recently, he would have wanted to lead the team to the Fuyun Mountain Range himself.

In the Xiaoyao Sect, apart from the Supreme Elder Li Mufeng, who had already advanced to the Nascent Soul stage three hundred years ago, among the remaining nine Jin Dan cultivators, the only ones with the greatest hope of forming a Nascent Soul were the Sect Master Yao Qianshu and Bai Yuxian.

Yao Qianshu, as the Sect Master of the Xiaoyao Sect, could be considered a person who was below one person and above ten thousand, apart from the Supreme Elder Li Mufeng. His cultivation had also long since reached the ninth layer of Jin Dan, and he had even impacted the Nascent Soul realm once. Now, he still had over a hundred years of lifespan left, and there was about a twenty or thirty percent hope of forming a Nascent Soul.

Another female Jin Dan cultivator, Bai Yuxian, although a woman, was a person of extraordinary talent. She was the only cultivator with heavenly spiritual roots in the State of Wei for hundreds of years. However, she was only two hundred-something years old and had already cultivated to the seventh layer of Jin Dan. The hope of forming a Nascent Soul in the future was even higher than that of Sect Master Yao Qianshu.

Most of the resources within the Xiaoyao Sect naturally tended toward these two people. Jin Dan cultivators like True Person Daoist Guangling within the sect were somewhat dissatisfied with this, but there was nothing they could do. After all, whether it was a cultivation family or a large sect like the Xiaoyao Sect, in order to successfully cultivate Nascent Soul cultivators to inherit the sect's legacy, doing so was also a last resort.

If a Nascent Soul sect was disconnected, and if the previous generation of Nascent Soul cultivators passed away, and there were suddenly no Nascent Soul cultivators presiding over the sect, it would inevitably attract the prying eyes of surrounding forces, and it would inevitably be difficult to avoid the end of the sect's decline.

However, the Xiaoyao Sect could still be considered good. The Nascent Soul Supreme Elder of this generation, Li Mufeng, was only seven hundred-something years old. Generally, Nascent Soul cultivators had at least a lifespan of twelve hundred years. Coupled with being able to take some high-tier life-extending spiritual items, they could live for another two or three hundred years. Normally, they could all persist until about fifteen hundred years old. As long as their luck wasn't too bad, the Xiaoyao Sect should have enough time to cultivate new Nascent Soul stage cultivators.

(End of chapter)