Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Slowly approaching the temple on the floating mountain where the strange pull was coming from, Xuan Hao was suddenly reminded of just how small he was as he soon found himself at the steps leading up to the temple.

Even just looking up towards the temple, he found himself unable to see it anymore, as the steps leading up to the temple itself had become small cliffs blocking his view. Not that it had much of an effect on his overall grasp of his surroundings, as his divine sense was still around to help him with this, but it was still a rather jarring experience.

Different from when he had first found himself being shrunk down while inside the small temple, he now officially started thinking about the issue of returning to his former size. After all he had no real guarantee that his size would be returned to normal after he completed the celestial trial and given the current broken state of his surroundings, he was feeling like there was a very real chance that he might not be able to return to his original size again even if he was originally supposed to do so after completing the celestial trial.

For this reason, he began to seriously contemplate the Dao of Space and its relation to the concepts of shrinking and expansion and how he might need to understand this concept if he wanted to return to normal again.

Unfortunately, as he began contemplating the Dao of Space and how it might be able to assist him in returning to his normal size, he quickly realized that shrinking someone without killing them was far more complicated than he had first thought. Resulting in him quietly standing on one of the steps leading up to the temple for a good half hour before finally pulling himself out of this train of thought.

In the end, he concluded that while his current comprehension of the Dao of Space wasn’t deep enough to recover his normal size, it was within the scope of the Perfection Realm of the Dao of Space. Meaning that he might be able to comprehend a way to restore his normal size by making use of the enlightenment chance from the system after he completed the celestial trial in case it didn’t restore him to his normal size.

Not just because it was rather uncomfortable to be so small, but also because he faced several serious restrictions tied to the Dao of Space at his current size.

Though these restrictions might not be directly from his decreased size, he could still sense that these restrictions would be broken if he managed to recover back to his normal size again.

This would not be him undoing the restrictions so to speak, but more so the restrictions coming undone on their own after the core principle that dictated for their activation had disappeared, the core principle in question being tied to his reduced side from what little he had managed to learn from the restrictions by studying them during his journey to the temple.

As his attention slowly turned back towards the temple, he also soon discovered that one of the demon beasts at the Peak of the Celestial Immortal Realm had moved a bit closer to his current location over the past half hour. Not by much, but still enough to make him feel a sense of urgency in searching through the temple for the origin of the strange pull he felt before the Peak Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast got close enough to notice his presence.

After all, even though he was confident to some extent when it came to facing off against a demon beast at the Peak of the Celestial Immortal Realm under normal circumstances, this wasn’t normal circumstances.

Not just because a fight breaking out would draw the attention of surrounding demon beasts, but more so because the strength of the strange demon beasts was simply terrifying.

If a Late Stage Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast in his current environment was compared to normal demon beasts, it would almost certainly be compared to one at the Peak of the Celestial Immortal Realm.

As for a Peak Stage Celestial Immortal Realm strange demon beast… He was almost certain that its strength had already surpassed the Celestial Immortal Realm and stepped into a different realm altogether. Not yet at the level of the Land Creation Realm so to speak, but definitely beyond the Celestial Immortal Realm.

More than enough reason for him to do his best to avoid them…

And as these thoughts drifted through his head while observing the slowly approaching demon beast through his divine sense, he directly reached the entrance to the small temple.

However, as he stood in front of the now towering temple entrance, he quickly realized that the temple in front of him was the same as the small temple he had explored when first arriving at the trial space.

Not just the general shape of the temple, but everything inside it was the same, from the placement of broken ornamental statues to the cracks in the walls. Everything was the same.

Wait… If everything is the same, then…

Whoosh-!

Feeling a hint of panic suddenly emerging in the depths of his mind as he realized something terrifying, Xuan Hao turned and rushed in the direction of the Hall of Knowledge inside the temple. Avoiding any demon beasts along the way without being discovered before finding himself hovering in front of an all too familiar looking scroll.

”…”

This scroll was none other than the scroll that had shrunk him a little over half a day earlier and looking at it now, he realized that the celestial trial he had believed to be about to end was very likely not over.

Swish~

And as if to confirm his doubts, he reached one of his hands out to touch the scroll. Soon enough feeling a strange power flowing out from the scroll and into his body the next second, before the scroll itself turned to dust and blew away when a gentle breeze passed through the Hall of Knowledge.

Having already felt that the origin of the strange pull was none other than the scroll that had now been reduced to dust, Xuan Hao also realized that the goal of this celestial trial didn’t seem to just be about him sneaking past a large number of demon beasts.

No.

The trial seemed far more stupid than he had originally anticipated, as he finally managed to grasp the essence of the trial from what had happened just now.

The strange power that flowed inside him from the scroll that he had felt a pull towards wasn’t something that would help him in completing the celestial trial. Instead, it was a restriction that made the trial more difficult.

The strange power that had flowed inside his body just now made that clear, as the restriction already placed on his usage of the Dao of Space strengthened even further. Making it close to impossible for him to use the Dao of Space for moving, let alone fighting.

Even worse, he also realized that the goal of the celestial trial was to kill a guardian that could be found inside the small temple he had first been at. Accessed by touching a scroll right next to the one he had touched to get shrunk down and have a restriction placed on him.

Apparently, this information had been recorded on the scroll of trials that he hadn’t had the chance to read.

As for how he suddenly knew about all of this… Well… It just so happened that he received a kind message from a past elder of the Mirage Sect encouraging him after he touched the scroll just now. Not only praising him for having the courage to challenge the guardian of the trial at the highest difficulty but also telling him about the trial itself and where to find the guardian in the process.

To be honest, he wanted to be angry about this sudden unfortunate development, but there was nothing he could do about it now that he had already ”bravely” increased the difficulty of the celestial trial. All he could do was lower his head and accept the current state of things and head back to challenge the guardian of the trial that he had somehow ended up missing by a hair’s breadth.

”How unlucky…” Quietly muttering this to himself as he looked off into the distance for a brief moment, Xuan Hao soon recovered from his somewhat dazed state of mind before leaving the temple to head back in the direction he had come from.

Considering that he had already spent half an hour pondering the Dao of Space at the steps of the temple, he had mostly recovered from the journey and didn’t need to rest before heading back.

Not that he would have been able to stay at the temple to rest even if he wanted to, as the strange demon beast at the Peak of the Celestial Immortal Realm had already gotten dangerously close…