Chapter 91 — Junior Sister, You’re Out!
Ten days later—
The sun peeked over the mountains, its dawn light just beginning to cleave the night sky.
As the first drum of the Morning Bell sounded throughout the Xuan Xing Sect, a sudden “Boom—!!” echoed from the direction of the Spirit Gathering Grotto.
At the entrance to the grotto, the three Xuan Xing Sect Disciples on duty, their sleepiness completely obliterated by the colossal sound.
“What was that?!”
“What’s happening?”
“Huh?”
The three, shaking their heads, quickly ran to three stone walls nearby and began inspecting the hundreds of bamboo tablets hanging on them.
“C-rank tablets are fine!!”
“B-rank tablets are also fine!”
“A… A-rank 32!! It seems the Spirit Gathering Array in A-rank 32 has exploded!!”
The two who had just finished checking B and C-rank tablets immediately turned ashen, staring at him in disbelief.
“Ex… exploded?! How could it explode? Could it be that a Senior Brother is attempting Golden Core Formation here?”
“As if!” Another person rolled their eyes. “Golden Core Formation takes place in the Spirit Gathering Grotto on Moon Spring Peak. The Spirit Gathering Arrays here can only be used for Qi Cultivation or Foundation Establishment.”
“Then why did it explode…”
“But it did explode! The tablet for A-rank 32 is cracked… No… it’s shattered?”
The person looked perplexed and quickly walked over to touch the bamboo tablet that had fallen from the wall. However, as their finger grazed the fragments of the tablet, they felt an intensely cold energy spread from their fingertips into their body, causing them to jump back three to four feet in pain.
It was at this moment that a flying sword descended from the sky.
Elder Qin, looking at the flustered three, frowned and asked, “What happened?”
“Ah? Elder Qin, it seems the Spirit Gathering Array in A-rank 32 has been frozen and shattered.”
“Frozen and shattered?”
Elder Qin frowned slightly and quickly stepped forward to examine the bamboo tablet shattered into countless pieces on the ground. After touching it, her eyes widened, and without another word, she charged into the grotto.
She remembered that this was the Spirit Gathering Array Pei Lianxue was using for her Foundation Establishment. Although she didn’t know what had happened inside yet, anything that could reduce a Spirit Gathering Array to this state was definitely not a good omen.
Pei Lianxue was the disciple she was most satisfied with among this generation and even previous ones. If any accident were to prevent her from continuing on the path of cultivation, not only would Pei Lianxue be devastated, but Elder Qin herself would be depressed for days.
Upon reaching the grotto of A-rank 32, Elder Qin found the stone door, which was supposed to be sealed, covered in frost. She reached out to touch it, then, using her hand as a sword finger, she forcefully flicked her wrist, drawing her spirit sword from her Storage Bag.
“You few, channel your spiritual energy to protect yourselves!”
Elder Qin said to the three disciples who had followed her. She lightly stroked the surface of her spirit sword with her left index and middle fingers, taking a deep breath.
“Hah!!”
*Boom—*
With a single swing of her sword, several sword shadows appeared before the stone door, instantly transforming into pieces of rock that fell to the ground.
However, as the stone door shattered, a large amount of icy cold spiritual energy surged outward from the grotto. The spiritual energy contained within this surge of cold air was extremely pure. Without mentioning cultivators at the Foundation Establishment Stage, even cultivators at the Core Formation Stage who did not possess a water spiritual root would experience their spiritual energy flowing in reverse after inhaling it.
Elder Qin quickly distributed some of her spiritual energy to the three disciples beside her, helping them withstand the scattered cold air. She then retrieved a high-grade fire crystal stone from her Storage Bag to absorb all the spiritual energy within the grotto.
She was eager to see the situation inside the grotto, but unfortunately, it was filled with dense white mist. Even though the fire crystal stone was doing its best to dissipate the frigid energy, she couldn’t see anything more than a foot in front of her.
After hesitating for a moment, Elder Qin called out, slightly anxious:
“Pei Lianxue!!”
“Ah?”
?
A voice filled with confusion came from inside the grotto, causing Elder Qin to freeze in stunned silence. Elder Qin was still unsure of what had happened inside, but from Pei Lianxue’s voice, it sounded like she was quite comfortable. To be comfortable while enveloped in such pure, cold energy?
Elder Qin’s forehead crinkled into ten deep lines. She waited silently in the corridor for a while. Seeing that Pei Lianxue still hadn’t emerged, she pondered for a moment and called out again:
“Pei Lianxue, are you unable to find the door?”
“Ah… Yes!!” Pei Lianxue replied from inside the grotto. “The mist is too thick, I can’t see…”
*Bang—*
“Ouch!!”
It sounded like she had just bumped her head against the wall.
“…”
Elder Qin was momentarily at a loss for expression. Since there were other Qi Refining Stage disciples undergoing Foundation Establishment nearby, she dared not release her Spiritual Sense to investigate. Doing so might cause her Nascent Soul stage Spiritual Sense to directly cause the spiritual energy of those disciples to flow in reverse, leading to their explosive deaths.
After waiting for a while longer, Pei Lianxue finally walked out of the grotto’s entrance. Seeing Elder Qin and three Senior Brothers and Sisters at the Early Foundation Establishment Stage waiting outside, she cowered and asked:
“Have… have I caused trouble?”
“Phew—”
Seeing that she was unharmed, Elder Qin finally breathed a sigh of relief. She quickly took out a cloak made of beast hide from her Storage Bag and wrapped it around Pei Lianxue.
“It’s good that you’re alright, but…”
As she spoke, she glanced back at the scene inside the grotto. She recalled the information about Pei Lianxue when she had first received the roster. On the roster, Pei Lianxue had received an A-rank in most aspects, with her only C-rank being her spiritual root aptitude.
—Three Spirit Root: Water, Wood, and Earth.
It wasn’t considered exceptionally good, but it wasn’t too bad in the grand scheme of the cultivation world either.
“What exactly happened here?”
Pei Lianxue blinked for a moment, then remembered what her Senior Brother had told her before she entered for Foundation Establishment. She quickly replied, “I accidentally shattered the Cold Sky Sand.”
“Cold Sky Sand? What were you doing with that thing?”
Pei Lianxue thought for a moment and replied, “My Senior Brother said it could save my life. If I encountered any danger, I should break the Cold Sky Sand, and then others wouldn’t be able to get close to me.”
Hearing this, Elder Qin was speechless. She even felt like going to find Pei Lianxue’s Senior Brother right now and giving him a good scolding.
“Nonsense! If you break the Cold Sky Sand, others won’t be able to get close to you, but you won’t survive either.”
She rubbed her nose bridge with a hint of helplessness, then tugged at Pei Lianxue’s cheek and reprimanded, “You were likely lucky this time. You just achieved Foundation Establishment, your internal spiritual energy is overflowing, and you might have a higher tolerance for cold. That’s why you’re fine. For anyone else, this would have been fatal on the spot.”
“Ah… Mm.” Pei Lianxue nodded shyly. “I understand.”
“Phew— It’s good that nothing happened anyway. Do you feel any pain anywhere?”
Pei Lianxue quickly shook her head. “No.”
“Then you should go back and rest for a few days. I’ll take responsibility for the damaged Spirit Gathering Array, but you need to write me a self-criticism report tomorrow or the day after.”
“Ah… Yes!!!”
“Still so energetic at a time like this…”
“Hehe… My Senior Brother taught me that.”
…
