Su Zhan and Yun Li sat cross-legged facing each other.
She propped her chin in her hand and quietly watched the girl space out.
Half a shichen had passed.
Yun Li had quickly entered a meditative state.
Throughout the process, Su Zhan had personally watched spiritual power like mist surge out from Yun Li’s body and gather again, circulating over and over, until it finally stabilized now.
Drawing qi into the body was the most basic breathing method for cultivators.
In ordinary lands, spiritual energy was abundant yet sparse, so the process of drawing it in was slow.
For a Qi Refining disciple, the spiritual power drawn in over an entire shichen might only barely match what a Foundation Establishment disciple could draw in ten minutes.
To raise one’s cultivation, the only way was to keep drawing qi and circulating it, exhausting one’s spiritual power again and again in order to increase the total amount one could contain.
The most basic judgment of a cultivator’s talent was the speed of drawing qi, followed later by factors such as spiritual root aptitude.
But if one’s talent was insufficient and one still wished to match the cultivation speed of those heaven’s chosen, then one could only rely on external aids.
The common methods were three: spirit-gathering formations, secret cultivation magical treasures, and medicinal pills.
Spirit-gathering formations were complicated to construct and expensive; generally only great clans or a sect’s core disciples could enjoy them.
Secret cultivation magical treasures were even rarer, something one could only meet by chance and never seek.
Medicinal pills could only benefit a person for a short time, could not last long, and very easily gave rise to problems that wasted all previous effort or even endangered one’s life.
Su Zhan belonged to the latter category.
In order to take a shortcut, she had chosen both medicinal pills and a spirit-gathering formation.
Although compared to cultivators who relied solely on pills she had avoided quite a few hidden dangers, from the present look of things it still was not much better.
She had only managed to build an empty castle in the air with an unstable foundation.
It was only because her own foundation was decent, plus long periods of closed-door cultivation using a spirit-gathering formation, that she had been able to preserve her current realm and not fall.
Cough, I digressed a bit.
In short, when Su Zhan heard Yun Li say her spiritual power was being rapidly consumed, then after a period of time was replenished on its own, she had thought the cause of this situation might be a spirit-gathering formation, which was why she had Yun Li perform breathing exercises.
If it was not, there would be no loss.
And right now, Yun Li’s current state had confirmed her guess.
There was indeed a spirit-gathering formation here, and it looked even more effective than ordinary ones.
In merely half a shichen, the spiritual power throughout Yun Li’s body had already circulated through twelve great heavenly cycles.
Her cultivation speed was almost more than fifty times that of the outside world, and there was still a trend of growing faster and faster.
Calculating at this rate, Su Zhan estimated that a Qi Refining cultivator like Yun Li cultivating here for one day would be equivalent to bitter cultivation for half a year outside.
Yet one must not underestimate this shortened half year.
Yun Li was already not far from Foundation Establishment.
This fortuitous encounter would not only shorten the time she needed to impact Foundation Establishment, but after experiencing such high-speed spiritual power circulation, her foundation had also been stabilized considerably.
It was entirely beneficial and harmless.
It was only a pity that such benefits could only be enjoyed by Yun Li.
Su Zhan’s meridians at present could not withstand spiritual power circulation of this intensity; it would easily backfire.
That was why she had spent this entire half shichen staring blankly at Yun Li.
If Yun Li could not bear it, she would wake her at the first moment.
But from the present look of things, there was temporarily no need for her to worry.
Envy. As expected of the female lead. Having the protagonist’s halo treatment is just different.
One day equaling half a year of bitter cultivation… Su Zhan sighed with emotion in her heart, full of envy.
Su Zhan had grown a little bored watching.
Her clothes had also been dried more or less completely, so she stood up, stretched lazily, and walked toward the other parts of this space.
The area here was not large.
One-third was occupied by the pool.
Of the remaining two-thirds, half was the location of the spirit-gathering formation, while the other half was a long, narrow passage.
At the end of the path was a cave.
But calling it a cave was not quite accurate.
If one had to describe it, “crevice” would be more fitting—an arched crevice, the gap left almost only enough for a person to walk in sideways.
And this gap was a little forced for Su Zhan.
After trying for five or six minutes, Su Zhan tightened her waist and sucked in her stomach, struggling through the stone crevice.
Before her eyes a wide space opened up, an entirely different world.
“At first extremely narrow, only enough for a person to pass; after walking dozens of steps further, it suddenly opened up wide.”
She murmured the words to herself as her gaze swept the area.
This cave the size of a basketball court had nothing particularly special about it aside from the small path that continued extending forward on the left.
There were no fields of crops, nor any signs of human habitation.
Only one place was very conspicuous.
A small earthen hut built of mud, and beside it a sword mound with more than ten wooden swords standing upright.
Well, actually, calling them wooden swords was not quite accurate either.
They were merely a large pile of wood that had been roughly cut into the shape of wooden swords.
Some were of uneven width, some of uneven length, some had curled tips, and some were blackened all over, looking as if they had once been used as fire pokers.
Su Zhan stepped closer to look, picked out the best one among them, and held it in her hand to examine.
Ordinary wood.
It seemed to have grown naturally resembling a sword, only simply processed with a handle added.
The blade portion was rough, and some places still looked a bit rounded.
On the hilt, a few childish characters were carved in a crooked, twisted hand—“World’s Number One Great White Swerd Guest Demon-Slaying Leftover Grinding Great Treasure Swerd.”
Su Zhan could not help laughing.
She could tell this thing was made by a child, and not a very old one at that.
Quite interesting.
Hmm… and it was full of misspellings.
What the hell was “Demon-Slaying Leftover Grinding”?
Beating up demons and making them turn a millstone?
And what was “Great Treasure Swerd”?
Most of the other swords were also carved with similar boastful writing.
Su Zhan even saw on that fire-poker-like wooden sword the words: “Peerless Divine Swerd, turned to ash in the hands of a fire demon, roasted beggar’s chicken with it, very fragrant.”
Finally, one spot in the sword mound was empty, yet the writing on it was full of dashing spirit.
Su Zhan looked at each one in turn, then placed every sword back in its original position and walked to the empty spot.
There she saw carved: “After more than ten years of bitter cultivation, I, Bai Qingqing, have finally advanced from wooden sword to iron sword. This great hero is determined to make a stunning debut, make a name throughout the world, and return in glory to marry Sister Liu as my wife!”
The handwriting was free and unrestrained, full of high spirits.
Only, she did not know whether this person had truly become a great hero later, or whether he had married the one he loved.
Su Zhan bent down and entered the earthen hut beside the sword mound.
The hut was not tall; its highest point only reached her chest.
Inside were four strangely shaped mounds of earth that could barely be called chairs, surrounding a crooked, uneven earthen table.
On that earthen table were placed some grayish medicinal pills, as well as spiritual fruits that had decayed into black, dried husks.
One could still sense a trace of spiritual energy remaining, but only a trace.
In the corner was an earthenware jar; whether it held water or wine was unknown.
The mouth of the jar was gray and decayed, with spider webs spun across it.
Apart from that, there was nothing else here.
Empty and desolate.
As expected, exploring a secret realm was something one still needed to team up with the female lead to do properly.
Su Zhan sighed with feeling.
“I shouldn’t have come alone.”
Otherwise the result would be just like this—unable to find any good things at all.
Mm… if I drag Yun Li over now, is it still in time?