Chapter 133: Submarine Grotto-Heaven, Removing Impurities from the Spiritual Vein?

Under the roaring torrent, six hundred zhang deep.

In the dim underwater realm, gravel covered the seabed.

Shen Lian hovered with a water-repelling bead resting atop his head, observing the spot discovered by the Five Elements Spirit Puppet. He attempted to probe it using his divine sense and spiritual power.

Nothing.

On the contrary, when his divine sense controlled the spirit puppet, an esoteric ripple connected the two.

It felt rather bizarre...

Just like exchanging secret codes.

Unable to comprehend it, one could only say... the Immortal Dao is supreme and indescribable.

These were not his words, but those of the successive Deity Transformation Patriarchs of the cultivation world.

Whenever something was baffling and defied explanation, it was always attributed to the indescribable.

He began to expand his divine sense once more, searching within this grotto-heaven. The deeper he went into the grotto-heaven, the smaller it became. His divine sense swept past everything one by one, yet still, nothing out of the ordinary was discovered.

The serpent of the five elements slammed into the conch shell, blasting the Sea Worm King back over ten zhang and shattering a large patch of coral, causing it to twist its body in agony on the spot.

A five-colored spiritual light, resembling a hemp rope, manifested.

......

Crack!

Currents gathered before him, instantly blowing these Qi-condensation-stage small fish into bursting pops.

The bloodline of the Gloomy Conch Sea Worms was low, even inferior to Dahei's, and their traces could be found everywhere across the ocean.

The flames showed no fear of seawater whatsoever, instantly igniting the back of the Sea Worm King. No matter how it rolled, the golden-white flames carved a massive hole through its back with the force of a decaying dryness, even melting away the single vertebra on its back.

Otherwise, taking down this Sea Worm King would truly have required a bit more effort.

Beneath the split coral mountain, a piece of a fractured arm bone was exposed, covered in dense, fine scale patterns.

The sound of 'puff, puff, puff' rang out, and clusters of dark blue blood spewed from the battered sea worm.

Within the 'grotto-heaven' coral mountain, a large swarm of Gloomy Conch Sea Worms indeed resided, the strongest among them being merely of the second rank, with no third-rank existence present.

Normally, cultivators in a battle only needed to kill a few opposing practitioners. If one were even to extract the spiritual veins, did they not want to survive their heavenly tribulation?

Why did heavenly killing tribulations arise? Why were cultivator battles so severe, and why were there so many rogue cultivators? It was all driven by resources.

Previously, the deployment of the Five Elements Interdiction all formed a five-colored halo of light.

Spiritual veins differed from spiritual stone mines; the spirituality within a spiritual vein flowed, and cultivators required specialized methods to extract it.

As a cultivator, he also had to handle things personally for once; his combat experience was simply far too scarce.

Oh, so that was how it looked inside.

Upon seeing this, the Sea Worm King let out a strange cry, and circles of conch-like patterns on its body lit up, actually growing a conch-like outer shell to form a defense.

Sensing the aura emanating from the sea worm, Shen Lian nodded. For his first time fighting a demonic beast on his own, he wanted to familiarize himself with the process first.

Perhaps due to the passage of time, the residual bones of the sea race had already merged with the spiritual vein, and a tainted aura of blood lingered deep within the spiritual vein.

Watching the Sea Worm King shriek in agony, Shen Lian did not halt his hands.

"Hah..."

It did not exist on the seabed; rather, it seemed to exist within a spatial tier, yet remained tethered to the vast ocean.

"Only when one is clean can one feel refreshed and pristine, isn't that right?"

"Right, what about the other skeletal remains of the sea race?"

At this moment, the slumbering Sea Worm King also awakened.

"It's probably not for that reason."

Although the bloodline of the Gloomy Conch Sea Worms was low, after advancing to the second rank, their intelligence was already comparable to that of a human child.

Through the gap, Shen Lian caught sight of a seashell covered in dark brown patterns.

Even though its divine abilities weren't much to speak of.

The further one went toward the rear, the denser the spiritual power in the water became. At the constricted waist resembling a gourd's middle, only Hailan spirit grass grew, and no fish, shrimp, or crabs swam about—evidently, they too knew the danger lurking within.

Shen Lian swung the magical sword in his hand, hacking down toward the coral once more. This time, he smashed the coral mountain to pieces, yet discovered nothing else.

"Hah..."

Shen Lian revealed a hint of surprise. With a bloodline inferior even to Dahei's, it had actually derived a bloodline divine ability.

Upon plunging into the 'grotto-heaven', Shen Lian was immediately captivated by the breathtakingly beautiful interplay of light within.

The vast majority of cultivators executed magical techniques in a rigid, step-by-step manner during battles, yet the execution of techniques required time.

"Spells variations..."

The moment he entered the grotto-heaven, four puppet talisman figures vanished in a flash from his entry point, burrowing into the gravel.

"Hah."

The rolling Sea Worm King was instantly pinned to the spot by the Five Elements Interdiction, scorched at the crown of its head by the golden-white flames, and died instantly.

Having muttered to himself, Shen Lian thrust downward fiercely with his sword, one strike after another.

In the blink of an eye, a month passed.

The viscous fluid drowned out the scorching heat of the seawater and, along the way, elevated the viscosity of the ocean water as well.

Those loose cultivators from a dozen or so years ago—the tidal island they found—should have been just a small patch of coral reef within the 'grotto-heaven' that broke the surface of the sea.

These sea worms all had bodies twisted into spiral shapes, with conch-like patterns growing on their backs and extremely long fangs. The smallest among them were a foot in size, and their total number exceeded five hundred.

As the very first second-rank demonic beast he had personally slain, Shen Lian accorded it some dignity, directly using his magical sword to disembowel its remains.

He gave it a try; the fingers of the residual bone clenched quite tightly.

Returning once more to the coral mountain where the Sea Worm King had inhabited, he sensed his surroundings bit by bit with his divine sense.

It was truly not easy.

Aside from the Gloomy Conch Sea Worms, the entire grotto-heaven was actually a miniature water world, inhabited by a wide variety of fish.

The water also harbored rich spiritual qi; even without the aid of a water-repelling bead, his physical body felt not the slightest sensation of stuffiness here.

Shen Lian released his divine sense within this grotto-heaven. His divine sense was compressed to sixty percent, leaving a range of only about twelve hundred zhang.

However, even if he had the means, he had no desire to extract the spiritual vein. Spiritual veins were nurtured by heaven and earth and served as the fundamental foundation for breeding spiritual treasures.

Recalling the primeval era, when the Heavenly Dao spoon-fed living beings and resources were abundant, who wasn't an ancient, high-minded, and untainted sage?

In the present era, spiritual qi was already inferior to that of ancient and medieval times, making the importance of spiritual veins all the more prominent.

Perhaps Heaven would take note of this unremarkable, tiny act of kindness today and spare him one lightning bolt during his tribulation.

Seeing the viscous, pitch-black fluid drifting toward him, he took a step back and prepared to form hand seals with both hands.

"Puff, puff, puff."

A Nascent Soul lackey was simply different from a loose cultivator.

How should he put it? This underwater place... let us provisionally call it a 'grotto-heaven'—was truly miraculous.

Shen Lian rubbed his hands together once more, and the serpent of the five elements flew out from his palms once again, crashing toward the Sea Worm King.

The Five Elements Fire Palm, blessed by the Tianyan Fire Domain, suffered no significant impact in the water.

Watching a bunch of Qi-condensation small fry being wiped out, Shen Lian finally savored the joy of being a Foundation Establishment grand cultivator.

One after another, they bared their fangs and lunged toward Shen Lian to slaughter him.

While clearing out the Qi-condensation-tier small fry, Shen Lian advanced toward the small gourd-belly in the rear.

With a clanging sound, Shen Lian withdrew his magical sword once more.

The spirit puppet dove right in.

He had originally intended to check if any of these small fry possessed decent bloodlines so he could capture one and sell it, but not a single one caught his eye.

His purpose in coming this time was to hunt demonic beasts. He opened his mouth and spat.

"Sea race."

The only minor regret was that they were all water-attribute demonic beasts.

A Foundation Establishment expert was truly terrifying to this degree.

Shen Lian also located the region where the Hailan spirit grass grew; it was right in the central waist area of the gourd.

Just like low-grade five-attribute-root cultivators, it was extremely difficult for such a bloodline to break through major tiers.

Pei Huoyu had been different previously; the several five-element spells he executed did not follow the standard spell-casting steps, and his spell-casting process was remarkably fluid.

At that moment, he was reminded of how Pei Huoyu had cast his spells back then.

The execution of spells should not be bound by rigid forms.

After searching the grotto-heaven several times, Shen Lian finally arrived before the spiritual vein.

Recalling the puppet talisman figures, Shen Lian focused his divine sense upon the spirit puppet.

He collected the scattered remains of the insects; last time in the deep sea, he had procured some spicy strips for Sanqian, and these could be left for Dahei to improve his palate.

Seashells again!

"Bloodline divine ability!"

A pitch-black demonic core.

A succession of five-colored palms formed, slaying the foremost Gloomy Conch Sea Worms.

As he approached the middle section of the gourd, within his suppressed divine sense, Shen Lian sensed the Gloomy Conch Sea Worms lurking inside.

Unlike Pei Huoyu, his fire and earth spells both had augmentations. For normal cultivators in the depths of the ocean, aside from metal and water spells which remained unaffected, fire-attribute spells suffered the greatest suppression.

"Five Elements Interdiction."

"Go!"

The hemp-rope swayed, and under the augmentation of five-element spiritual power, it swelled to a size of one zhang, transforming into a serpent that burst through the viscous fluid and struck straight at the head of the Gloomy Conch Sea Worm King.

As for why only that tiny bit had been exposed back then, do not ask; to ask was to say that the Immortal Dao is supreme and indescribable.

Faint wisps of spirituality also emanated from the seashell.

Beyond that, nothing special was discovered.

All the sea worms lay scattered within the coral mountain. At the central position stood a coral mountain several dozen zhang in size, beneath which crouched a Sea Worm King that looked like a small mountain.

Slowly approaching the entrance, the spirit puppet and his main body merged into one, and five-colored spiritual light began to shine upon Shen Lian.

It directly formed a halo enveloped in a layer of five-colored light mist, shrouding the Sea Worm King within it.

So he himself was actually quite formidable as well.

He probed it as well, discovering that this spirituality lacked a certain 'vitality' compared to the spirituality found within the white seashell of years past.

After adapting for a moment, a scene emerged within his divine sense ocean.

Splitting the water-attribute spirit puppet apart, he carefully burrowed downward into the gravel.

However, owing to the blessing of the Tianyan Fire Domain, this normal phenomenon was reversed instead.

Surveying the remaining sea worms all around, Shen Lian waved his hand, shooting out strands of five-colored brilliant light that pierced through and slaughtered the sea worms one by one.

Yet Shen Lian tested it and found that the Five Elements Spirit Puppet held no interest in the spirituality released from this seashell.

In an instant, strands of five-colored, fire-infused palms covered dozens of sea worms.

Approaching the Sea Worm King, which had been more than half-scorched, he began his inspection.

For the Nether Sea Worm to break through its bloodline shackles, other spiritual items should be required.

Either this second-rank sea worm had lived long enough, or something here had allowed it to break through its bloodline shackles.

The presence of the sea race was no surprise; the sea race had once been the overlord of this ocean region, though for unknown reasons they had retreated from the Myriad Star Seas.

At this moment, as Shen Lian executed his technique, with a breath he also blew a puff of air into the halo of light, and five-element spiritual power poured forth from his mouth.

Having inspected everything once more and finding no omissions in the surroundings, Shen Lian set his Five Qis Toward the Origin technique into motion within his body, gathering boundless five-element magical power into his palms.

It felt very smooth and moist.

Yet his son Dahei had been raised for so long without ever giving birth to a bloodline divine ability.

His divine sense wandered across the spiritual vein several times, and Shen Lian finally discovered the remaining skeletal remains of the sea race hidden beneath it.

"Could it be that this Sea Worm King was simply lucky, mutating under the blessing of the spiritual vein?"

Unlike the outer seabed covered entirely in gravel, the interior was a dazzling array of reefs, sea grass, seashells, and coral, all gleaming with varying brilliance.

That faint blue hue flickering beneath the gravel... ultra-thin...

With every breath he took, he had already charged into the sea worm colony, slaughtering over a hundred sea worms.

Having scouted the internal landscape of the 'grotto-heaven', Shen Lian finally decided to take action.

"Mid-second rank."

"Spiritual vein fellow daoist, if you possess sentience, you must see clearly: I am merely helping you weed out the impurities."

He had already tested it earlier: he could use the Five Elements Spirit Puppet to allow his true body to enter inside.

"Hum!"

Shen Lian felt his divine sense ocean shudder violently, and his connection with the spirit puppet instantly weakened by fifty percent.

With every breath, pitch-black viscous fluid flowed from its mouth, clinging to unchewed fragments of fish and shrimp.

Dealing with these outer Qi-condensation-tier sea worms, Shen Lian moved as though entering an uninhabited realm, severing limbs and sending them flying wherever he passed.

"Puff..."

"Go."

The outer layer of the 'grotto-heaven' was a thin placental membrane that encircled a mountain composed of coral.

Following this, Shen Lian flipped his hands as he formed hand seals, pressed his palms together, and rubbed them fiercely, releasing five-element spiritual power within his palms.

The Sea Worm King let out a strange cry, curling back into a ball and activating the spiral markings on its body.

Shen Lian instantly perceived that his movement had encountered restriction.

Clang.

The spiritual vein happened to lie right at the waist of the gourd, connecting the front and rear bulbs, with a length of only about one li, and Hailan spirit grass grew at its very center.

With a single sword thrust, spiritual qi surged forth, rushing into his mouth in a torrent.

"Cough, cough... Every debt has its debtor; let retribution fall upon the sea race."

"Puff..."

(End of this chapter)