Chapter 119: The Mysterious Starry Sky

Chapter 119: The Mysterious Starry Sky

“This place looks just like a three-dimensional map of the stars.”

Jiang Yan murmured inwardly as he gazed at the mysterious starry sky before him.

This was the very starry sky through which the spatial passage had passed when the boundary gates condensed it between the two realms.

The starry sky was shrouded in darkness. Far away, countless pinpricks of light flickered in the boundless night—the radiance emitted by innumerable great worlds, each shining with its own light. Closer by, beams of light from some unknown source occasionally swept across the darkness, revealing countless egg-shaped worlds, each about the size of a steamed bun. Closer still were two enormous ovoid worlds, glowing with a faint ocher light, one standing not far to Jiang Yan’s left and the other to his right. Around each colossal world were further eggs, gradually diminishing in size.

The starry sky was utterly silent. Only the enormous egg-shaped worlds in the distance, flickering with pale yellow and black radiance in the darkness, seemed to proclaim its existence to Jiang Yan.

Calming his mind and steadying his breath, Jiang Yan began searching for the Heavenly Peak Realm, where Linqing Prefecture lay. Only by finding the sword token bearing the imprint of his own blood, and identifying the special mark it emitted, could he determine the location of the Heavenly Peak Realm and return to Mount Hua.

He slowly circulated the Spirit-Refining Method, cautiously restoring the spiritual sense he had lost upon entering the mysterious starry sky.

“Spiritual sense made manifest, all things taking form…”

The words of the first level of the Spirit-Refining Method slowly flowed through Jiang Yan’s mind. Now that he had advanced to become a first-grade talisman master, he could cultivate the complete first level of the technique. Thus, while using it to restore his spiritual sense, he was also unconsciously practicing the entire first-level spiritual-sense formula.

The mysterious starry sky seemed to contain an abundance of power capable of aiding the recovery of spiritual sense. After cultivating the Spirit-Refining Method for barely the time it took to finish half a cup of tea, Jiang Yan’s spiritual sense had already returned to its peak.

His spiritual sense swept silently across the enormous egg-shaped world before him, and an immense quantity of information flowed from within it into his mind…

A mother chasing after a mischievous child, a woodsman gathering firewood on the mountain, a swordsman walking through the forest…

Jiang Yan slowly searched the world for familiar signs of Mount Hua. But when his spiritual sense detected a middle-aged man standing upon a flight of stone steps on the mountainside, the man suddenly raised his head and glanced in Jiang Yan’s direction. He muttered something under his breath, and Jiang Yan felt his spiritual sense tremble violently.

It was as though a gigantic cleaver had hacked through it. A sharp pain erupted in the very center of his mind, and the middle-aged man, the mother chasing her child, and everything else vanished from his perception.

“Buzz…”

The milky-white beam of light on the boundary gate suddenly disappeared, and the gate returned to its original state. Jiang Yan’s spiritual sense had withdrawn from the Demon-Hunting Gate.

Clutching his head, Jiang Yan rose painfully from the meditation cushion. He drew several hissing breaths of cold air. His spiritual sense had been injured again, and the sensation was truly agonizing. Compared with his previous injuries, this time seemed far more severe. It felt as though a section of his spiritual sense had been severed outright.

“That was merely a minor warning. Do not casually pry into another talisman master again.”

The middle-aged man’s words still echoed in Jiang Yan’s mind. The man whose presence Jiang Yan had inadvertently sensed was actually a talisman master, and certainly one of considerable rank. In a single encounter, he had not only discovered Jiang Yan’s intrusion but had also injured him while issuing a warning never to spy carelessly on another talisman master.

“Senior Brother, what happened?”

Tang Wan’s lovely face was filled with anxiety, and her eyes brimmed with worry as she hurriedly supported Jiang Yan.

Jiang Yan shook his head, then clenched his fist and struck himself several times on the forehead. Drawing in a breath through his teeth, he said, “It’s nothing. I accidentally glimpsed a talisman master just now, and my spiritual sense was injured.”

Tang Wan helped Jiang Yan sit back down on the meditation cushion and asked uneasily, “Your spiritual sense was injured. Will it affect your mind?”

“Lady Tang, there is no need to worry. So long as Benefactor Jiang properly cultivates his spiritual-sense technique, once his spiritual sense has recovered, no lasting harm will remain.”

Monk Wukong held one palm upright before his chest as he spoke to Tang Wan.

“Little Master, cultivators are as numerous as clouds in every realm, and there must be many talisman masters among them. If I search realm after realm, who knows how badly my spiritual sense might be injured? Might you offer me some guidance?”

Jiang Yan sat cross-legged on the cushion, his right hand pressed to his forehead, his tone distinctly displeased. Searching a single realm was already so difficult. If he had to search the countless egg-shaped worlds hidden here, would that not be courting death?

“Benefactor need only search for the realm with which he has a connection. Searching every realm would waste both effort and spiritual strength, and would make it even less likely that you would find the Heavenly Peak Realm.”

Monk Wukong looked at Jiang Yan with some puzzlement. From his expression, it was almost as though Jiang Yan had made an elementary mistake.

When a talisman master used a boundary gate to communicate with another boundary gate, the two gates possessed a special identifying mark. Thus, once a cultivator’s spiritual sense entered the mysterious starry sky, it would quickly be drawn toward the other world containing the corresponding boundary gate. The spiritual sense would enter that world directly, locate the boundary gate, and establish a passage between the two.

If a locating spiritual treasure had formed a connection with the boundary gate, then after the talisman master’s spiritual sense entered the mysterious starry sky, the bond between the master and the treasure would allow him to sense the treasure’s precise location. He could then find the realm where it lay, enter with his spiritual sense, and establish a connection between the treasure and the boundary gate.

Jiang Yan’s method of sweeping his spiritual sense across the egg-shaped great worlds was both laborious and futile. Worse, he might easily anger certain talisman masters by spying upon them and provoke them into hunting him down. Countless cultivators had been pursued and killed merely for prying into others’ affairs, their corpses left exposed in the wilderness. Talisman masters were among them as well.

Jiang Yan had been fortunate. Although he had been discovered, he had received only a minor punishment.

Once he understood the trick involved, Jiang Yan’s spiritual sense had nearly recovered. He walked beneath the boundary gate and looked up at the plaque above it. His heart stirred, and once again his spiritual sense surged forth, invading the mysterious starry sky beyond the gate.

The familiar egg-shaped great worlds appeared before him once more, standing to his left and right…

Recalling Monk Wukong’s words, Jiang Yan calmed his mind and steadied his spiritual sense, trying to perceive the great world capable of drawing him toward it.

His spiritual sense continued spreading outward. Invisible strands of perception wound through the silent starry sky, searching for the Heavenly Peak Realm that called to Jiang Yan’s spiritual sense.

“Whew…”

Jiang Yan let out a long breath. Sitting cross-legged on the meditation cushion, his chest heaved violently as he gulped down the fresh air.

This was far from the first time he had activated his spiritual sense to search for the Heavenly Peak Realm in the mysterious starry sky, only to withdraw from it utterly exhausted after one fruitless attempt after another.

“Senior Brother, let us search for the Heavenly Peak Realm again tomorrow.”

Tang Wan’s lovely face was full of concern as she looked at Jiang Yan. Seeing him exhausted to this degree pained her deeply. If her senior brother wore himself out, she would rather they never leave this place at all.

Holding several green fruits in her hands, Tang Wan watched anxiously as Jiang Yan ate them. Several monks from the Temple of Life Transformation had found the fruits while searching among the Azure Heaven Trees, claiming that they were highly effective in restoring spiritual sense.

Jiang Yan casually wiped the sweat from his forehead and bit greedily into the fruit Tang Wan had handed him. Chewing as he spoke, he said indistinctly, “It’s fine, it’s fine, Wan’er. These searches for the Heavenly Peak Realm have certainly exhausted me, but my spiritual sense has also grown remarkably. The results are far greater than those of cultivating the Spirit-Refining Method in the usual way.”

Tang Wan held the edge of her sleeve and gently wiped the sweat from his face. Her voice was tender yet helpless.

“But, Senior Brother, if you exhaust yourself, what use is rapid progress in your cultivation?”

Jiang Yan took the last fruit from her hand and opened his mouth wide to bite into it. His voice was filled with confidence.

“Junior Sister, rest assured. I know my own limits…”

A white beam of light shot from above the white boundary gate, and Jiang Yan’s spiritual sense once again entered the gate…