Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Chapter 2012  A Path to the Ancient Secret Realm

Silently slipping through the guardian formation that protected the Li Clanʼs treasury, Xuan Hao began shifting through the treasures that had been obtained by the Li Clan throughout the years alongside different artifacts and treasures that had been brought along with them from their time before they had left the ancient secret realm and settled down.

Impressive as the artifacts and other things inside the treasury for a small cultivation clan where the strongest one had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm, there wasnʼt anything valuable enough to draw his attention amidst the treasury that could make even a Dao Seed Realm cultivator feel some greed.

The only thing that had caught him a bit off guard when he slipped inside the treasury was the sheer quantity of spirit stones present, as the number far surpassed what should have been possible for such a small cultivation clan to accumulate. Originally believing that it was part of what they had taken along with them when leaving the ancient secret realm, only to find out after shifting through a few records that recorded who placed and took different things from the treasury, that the large quantity of spirit stones hadnʼt come from the past of the Li Clan, but had instead come from Li Fengʼs mother.

Why so many spirit stones had been left for the Li Clan in the first place instead of something different was a mystery, but it did at the very least help him confirm that the strength of Li Fengʼs mother was definitely beyond the Nascent Soul Realm, as it would have been impossible for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to get their hands on so many spirit stones.

Unfortunately, as he continued his search through the treasury of the Li Clan, it became clear that there werenʼt any ancient artifacts hidden within.

However, even with this, it wasnʼt entirely enough for him to give up, as the clan head and a few of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the Li Clan also had interspatial rings on them… And if there truly was something valuable hidden within the Li Clan that couldnʼt be found within the treasury of the clan, it would almost certainly be found within one of those interspatial rings.

Problem was that it was far from simple to look through someoneʼs interspatial ring without them noticing anything in the process.

The only reason why Xuan Hao himself felt confident in being able to accomplish something like that without fearing discovery was because of his far superior cultivation alongside his mastery of the Dao of Space that would make it simple for him to bypass what little defensive measures might be in place around the interspatial rings.

His Dao of Illusion being a second layer that could be used in case he ended up somehow failing to secretly shift through the interspatial rings, as there was always the option of him just throwing the elders and clan head into an illusion if the situation called for it.

Of course, to start off with, he decided to first pay the clan head a visit, as he was not only the strongest in the clan, but also the most likely individual to be carrying something that might originally have been stored inside the sect treasury.

So poor… But the sight that met him upon searching through the interspatial ring was a sight that left him somewhat surprised at just how poor this clan head was, though on second thought, it might be because he decided to store his things inside of the clan treasury instead of his own personal interspatial, as it wasnʼt exactly large enough to hold much more than the essentials.

On the other hand, the elders who had interspatial rings were far wealthier by comparison, as one of them had so many spirit stones on him that Xuan Hao found himself wondering if the other party had been secretly stealing from the pile of spirit stones inside the treasury hoping that no one would notice the disappearing spirit stone due to the sheer quantity present.

As for any ancient artifacts that might have originally been taken away by the Li Clan when it had originally set off from the ancient secret realm… He did find a few hidden within the interspatial rings, though most of them were just keepsakes that had been passed down with no real effect outside of their ancient history.

The only ones that looked promising were two ancient artifacts that just so happened to have been taken away by the same elder that had a suspiciously large quantity of spirit stones inside his interspatial ring, something that almost immediately confirmed to him that there was a real chance these ancient artifacts might be what he had been looked for-

Whoosh~

So, without hesitation, he directly trapped the elder in an illusion while he took out the two ancient artifacts to inspect them more closely. Ensuring that the entire process remained undetected throughout, as the elder in question found himself cultivating like he had originally been doing inside the illusion without realizing that he had been trapped inside an illusion in the first place.

Not having to worry about the elder, Xuan Hao focused his attention towards the two ancient artifacts in question.

The first was a jade pendant, though covered in different engravings compared to the one Li Feng was carrying, while the second was a small formation disc that he had almost mistaken for a normal worn-down silver plate at first glance. Only because of his understanding of the Dao of Formations did he barely pick up a hard to discern formation symbol on the disc and determined it to be some kind of ancient formation disc.

Of the two, by far the pendant was the one that drew the most of his attention given what he had seen from the pendant carried around by Li Feng, but… As he began testing the pendant to try and figure out what it was used for, he was left disappointed to discover that the abilities of the pendant had nothing to do with reaching the ancient secret realm. Instead, it had around a dozen different spells inscribed on it that would allow the wielder to use them even without the corresponding cultivation base if there was enough spiritual qi stored inside of it. Potentially the reason why this elder had been carrying around so many spirit stones compared to his peers.

However, this pendant was far from being in a perfect state, as most of the inscribed spells had been eroded away. Leaving only a few lower-level spells available, with the strongest being a fire spell that conjured up a concentrated ball of fire with power to injure or even kill someone at the Soul Ascension Realm if used correctly.

Although the higher-level spells inscribed on the jade pendant might have proven useful to the Star Shattering Sect, they werenʼt in a state where anything could be recovered. Resulting in the jade pendant being returned as his attention shifted towards the formation disc.

”Hm? Spatial formation symbols!?” And almost immediately, he felt a sense of excitement welling up inside him as he discovered that some of the spatial symbols present on the ancient formation disc were spatial symbols, symbols he had grown rather familiar with thanks to him setting up the sectʼs teleportation network and precious encounters with teleportation formations.

Even better, as his now excited mind fully locked in on the formation disc, he discovered a set of spatial coordinates engraved on the formation disc that kept changing but roughly corresponded with the spatial coordinates he had obtained of the ancient secret realm before being forced to leave by the spatial storm he had ended up causing with his presence.

Any thought of returning the ancient formation disc disappeared, as he casually changed the illusion that the elder was trapped inside of to show something going wrong with the ancient formation disc, causing him to pull it up, after which it blew up in his face. Ensuring that he wouldnʼt be missing the formation disc when he left the illusion and ended up looking through his interspatial ring later.

But that wasnʼt the end, as Xuan Hao kept his attention focused, he discovered that with his current strength, he was more than strong enough to activate the ancient formation disc and use it to reach that ancient secret realm.

The only problem he now found himself facing regarding the ancient secret realm was the fact that a clear passage didnʼt mean that the guardian formation wouldnʼt attack him.

Recklessly trying to enter that ancient secret realm would undoubtedly result in him being erased in a similar way to the divine sense he had forced inside earlier on.

In the end, he still needed to find some way to ensure his own safety in the face of that guardian formation, as he doubted he had the ability to hide himself or face that kind of terrifying ancient formation with his current strength.