CH 292

“Haha! I didn’t think that you guys would leave some scraps for me. I wonder what good stuff this box contains?” With his intentions seen through by Mister Bu, Shang Xia no longer maintained his courteous look. He couldn’t wait to open the box.

However, he was stopped by Mister Bu. “Haha, take a look after you get back. We’re approaching the gates. You better not let other people discover this.” 

Suppressing the excitement in his heart, Shang Xia decided to take the man’s advice. He soon added, “Oh right, I apologize for my actions. If not for my insistence to bring you into the depths of the Thousand Leaf Mountain Range, you wouldn’t be injured.” 

Shang Xia was sincerely apologetic for what he had done. However, his apology was met with a soft chuckle from Mister Bu. “You can’t be blamed for this. Everything happened too suddenly and we were caught off guard. Luckily, it ended well. At the very least, I found several people to work with for our plans on the Changfeng City.” 

Shang Xia’s eyes lit up and he continued questioning, “Are you talking about the black-clothed man? He seems really familiar to me. I wonder where I’ve seen him before…” 

“Hah. You’ll know when the time comes…” Mister Bu laughed.

“What are your plans for the future? How should we communicate in the future?” Shang Xia asked.

Thinking for a second, Mister Bu muttered, “You should have seen Old Wu from the forge the other day. If you notice a little copper bell under his shop sign, that would mean that I’m looking for you. If you need to find me, you can tell him directly. He’ll know where to find me.” 

After confirming their mode of communication, they were about to enter the city when Mister Bu stopped walking. A strange look appeared on Shang Xia’s face as he turned to look at the Martial Extermination Realm expert.

All of a sudden, he discovered a violent fluctuation of heaven and earth qi in the distance. Shang Xia looked at Mister Bu with a look of confusion, but he saw the Martial Extermination Realm expert staring into the air in the northern direction.

Shang Xia followed his gaze, and he found himself looking at a huge mirage. A massive manor that was surrounded by huge rock formations seemed to appear on the horizon. He couldn’t be more familiar with the mirage. It looked exactly the same as the Coral Forest back in the battlefield between the two worlds!

“Mysterious Coral World?” Shang Xia muttered to himself.

“That’s right. Looks like the Tongyou Institution’s scheme that had gone on for twenty years finally bore fruit.” Mister Bu sighed. However, the deep frown on his face betrayed his true feelings.

“Is there anyone who will try to stop them?” Shang Xia couldn’t help but ask.

Mister Bu glanced at him from the corner of his eye and muttered, “Heh. Now, their enemies will be revealed. Those who are plotting against the institution have to make their move.” 

When he was done, he turned to look at Shang Xia and he continued, “I thought we had a lot more time to prepare. Looks like things are going out of control. With the arrival of the Mysterious Coral World, the Tongyou Institution will throw all consideration to the wind in order to reach the status of a holy land. The Changfeng City has to react immediately. We’re out of time. Here’s the new plan. I’ll save the third in command of the Eighteen Horsemen in three days and prevent the Changfeng City from cooperating with the Ji Continent!” 

When he was done, he shot a final glance at the faint appearance of the Mysterious Coral World in the distance before turning to enter the city.

“Wait, wait, wait! What is our plan exactly?” Shang Xia asked.

Without turning his head, Mister Bu yelled, “You’ll know when the time comes!” However, he seemed to have thought of something else and he continued, “When you return, do your best to improve your spear art. You will need all the strength you can get.”

When he was done, his figure blurred and disappeared.

“Hah… How can I improve my Providence Spear Art so easily? If I manage to use three months to comprehend a new move, I’ll be thanking the gods! How am I supposed to do anything in three days?” Shang Xia shook his head helplessly. Retracting his aura, he returned to his disguise as an ordinary hunter as he entered the city.

Walking along the streets of the Changfeng City, he saw that the Mysterious Coral World had attracted a lot of attention.

As the skies turned darker, the mirage of the Mysterious Coral World started to fade. The heaven and earth qi in the air seemed to become more active. Shang Xia could feel that the heaven and earth qi was fluctuating a lot more wildly than usual, and if he felt that was, things would be way worse for the others. In fact, they could even describe the increase in activity as ‘tyrannical’!

Suppressing his Origin True Qi to the best of his abilities, Shang Xia found it trying to force itself free. If that kept up, his cultivation would definitely suffer some damage!

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Noticing the abnormality he was feeling, he could tell that many others were having it worse. If anyone were in seclusion at that moment, the sudden change in heaven and earth qi would cause all their efforts to go down the drain. Some weaker ones might even experience cultivation deviation and lose control of their inner qi altogether!

As if the world was trying to prove Shang Xia right, a miserable cry left the lips of a cultivator not too far away. He fell to the ground, twitching. Strange masses formed under his skin and they started moving about as though rats were running inside him.

“It’s bad! He’s experiencing cultivation deviation!” A guard near the gate growled. “Give him some space to breathe. Enter the city quickly!” 

Shang Xia wanted to make his move to help the man, but the situation was worse than he thought. Several palpitating sounds could be heard as the bones on his body started to crack. His body shriveled up and the heaven and earth in the area started to fluctuate. There was no saving him.

Shang Xia had no choice but to enter the city with the large group around him. They circled around the dying cultivator to pass through the city gates.

The moment they entered the city, the fluctuating heaven and earth qi calmed down. It was in stark contrast to the outside world.

“There’s a formation around the city!” 

Many people were rushing along the streets, and all of them were clearly cultivators. Ordinary humans who couldn’t cultivate didn’t possess inner qi in their bodies, and they couldn’t feel the heaven and earth qi around them. They were the only group of people who were unaffected by the changes to the world around them.

When Shang Xia returned to his courtyard, he saw Yuanyuan playing with several kids who lived nearby. He handed the bag of sweets he bought along the way to Yuanyuan and got her to share them with her newfound friends.

“Creak.” Shang Xia left Yuanyuan to her own devices before walking into the courtyard. Feeling the slight pulse of heaven and earth qi, he could tell that someone had recently completed their cultivation session.

“You’re back!” Hai Min wrapped a thick coat around herself as the sharp light in her eyes faded. Watching how she tried to hide her aura, Shang Xia didn’t plan on exposing her. 

He chuckled in response, “You don’t seem to mind Yuanyuan playing around by herself outside…” Of course, he knew that with Hai Min’s current cultivation level, she could hear everything that was going on where Yuanyuan was playing. She would be able to rush over if anything went wrong.

Since Hai Min wanted to live an ordinary life, Shang Xia decided to let her do as she wished. After all, she didn’t know that he was a cultivator either. 

Ever since leaving the mountain range, Shang Xia had closed his wounds. He changed into a fresh set of clothes so that Hai Min wouldn’t be able to notice anything off.

The events that transpired that day were frightening, even by Shang Xia’s standards. He saved several members of the Eighteen Horsemen before crawling back from the gates of hell when they were discovered by Martial Extermination Realm experts. He might have closed the wounds he received during the battle forcefully with his inner qi, but his body needed some more time to heal. After dinner, Shang Xia didn’t even practice his talisman crafting and neither did he try to cultivate. He crawled into bed and fell asleep instantly.

When he woke up the next day, his injuries were much better. The wounds were closing and he felt extremely refreshed.

It also didn’t take long for him to notice that the heaven and earth qi in the city was a lot denser than before.

Naturally, that was merely the situation in the Changfeng City. He didn’t know how terrifying the heaven and earth fluctuations were outside the city, or the current situation in the Tongyou City.

Next, he merged his divine sense with the world around him. He noticed that the radius he could detect had increased. He also discovered that there was no movement from the other room. Clearly, Hai Min and Yuanyuan were still in deep sleep.

With nothing else distracting him, Shang Xia retrieved the box Mister Bu handed over to him outside the city gates. A sense of anticipation filled him when he thought about the reward he was getting came from Liang Shuangren, a Martial Extermination Realm expert from the Azure Spiritual World.

Opening the box carefully, Shang Xia discovered a stalk of Snow Ginseng that was covered in red threads. There were several talismans surrounding the item too. The ginseng was as clear as jade, and there were several vein-like strands running through its body.

Even though Shang Xia didn’t know what the Snow Ginseng was worth, or what it could be used for, he could tell that it was an extremely precious treasure from how well it was kept.

“This should be a special herb that grows in the Azure Spiritual World… I might not know its rank, but it shouldn’t be anything worse than a rank four treasure. I’ll look for Instructor Zhang Haogu after returning to the institution to identify the treasure!” Shang Xia muttered to himself.

Keeping the box carefully in his Embroidered Cloud Case, Shang Xia decided to head out to buy breakfast.

When he stepped out of his room, he stretched his body slightly and discovered that there were no movements from Hai Min’s room. A sudden urge to practice his spear arts overwhelmed him and the Scarlet Star Spear appeared in his hands.

After swinging it around twice, Shang Xia sent a trace of his Origin true Qi into the spear. He slowly entered his stance to display his first move, Rift Crossing!

As soon as he did, the scene in front of his eyes changed as a trace of red-hot inner qi entered his body from inside the spear. Before Shang Xia could react, the trace of inner qi fused with his Origin True Qi.

A ball of mist appeared in his vision and a faceless figure appeared within it. The faceless figure started demonstrating different spear arts with precise moves, causing Shang Xia to gasp in shock.