Chapter 23

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Back home, Chu Chen finished washing up and sat in a lotus position, cultivating the mysterious Spiritual Genesis Mantra. After a few days of cultivation, Chu Chen noticed that although this cultivation method had been slow, it had brought many benefits to him once it had been activated. Not only had it been strengthening his spiritual energy, it also boosted his physical body strength, mental clarity, focus, and various aspects.

It gave him an all rounded boost. That alone had been much better than the Spirit Drawing Mantra that was taught by the Crystal Spring Sect.

However, this cultivation method required way too many elixirs.

Chu Chen frowned. The small bottle of elixirs he had to earn through refining elixirs for three days were used up very quickly, yet his cultivation had not improved that much.

After consuming all three elixirs from the other day, it only made his cultivation move forward by an inch.

However, under the effects of the spirit gathering elixir, his cultivation speed had gone up by over five times even if it had been still very slow.

Looking at the rate he consumed the elixirs, if he had continued cultivating the Spirit Genesis Mantra, he was afraid that the three level-1 elixirs a day that he had gotten as rewards were far from enough; even when the reward he had gotten for his job had already been much better than others.

Regardless, he had continued cultivating. That also meant that he had required a lot more spirit gathering elixirs. Meanwhile, Chu Chen had been running a tight deadline. After all, three months would have passed in the blink of an eye.

It seemed that he still had to try transfiguring into the eaglet to enter Black Fog Valley to harvest the spiritual herbs from within. Otherwise, there would have been no hope for his cultivation progress.

With that, Chu Chen stabilized his cultivation stage and slowly calmed himself down. He extended his spiritual consciousness outward. At the same time, far away in the nest atop a withered tree above Black Fog Valley, the eaglet flapped its wings and stood up, alert.

The eaglet’s body had been growing at an extremely fast rate. Upon reentering this clone of his, Chu Chen noticed that the eaglet’s body had been one size larger from before and its body had grown some strong feathers. The initial fuzzball of an eaglet had unknowingly started developing traits of a majestic eagle.

He once again ate a few fragments of egg shells and felt himself filled with energy. At the same time, Chu Chen realized that his food supply had been running low as well. If he had finished all the egg shells at that moment, he would have had to start looking for food.

Food for this mutated eaglet had surely been extraordinary. Then again, he would have eventually found a way. At that moment, he could only have worried about what had been ahead.

Chu Chen wobbled along to the edge of the nest and looked down. After a moment of hesitation, he spread his wings with his newly formed feathers and jumped off the edge.

The sense of weightlessness rushed to his head again. The next moment, he felt a force holding him up by the wings and he suddenly halted in his fall.

‘I’m flying!’

Excitement welled up in Chu Chen’s heart. He flapped his wings and circled around freely in the air.

A regular person would have had no chance to have enjoyed that feeling. The feeling of having freedom under the skies, where the entire world suddenly seemed to have transformed into an open expanse. It had been an incredibly proud and indescribable feeling.

After flying about excitedly for a while, Chu Chen remembered his main objective. After having identified the direction of Black Fog Valley, he flew in towards it with his wings flapping.

It had been late at night and the land had been covered in darkness. However, with the eagle vision Chu Chen possessed, he had clearly seen the fine details from a great distance, having made it impossible for him to have gotten lost. 

In just a few moments, he had arrived at the entrance of Black Fog Valley. Wafts of pungent stenches lingered around his nose. That had been the poisonous magical mist of Black Fog Valley. However, that mist had little effect on the eaglet.

Chu Chen frowned and hesitated for a moment before having shot straight into the valley like an arrow.

In an instant, the world around him went dark. An immense pressure fell upon him all of a sudden. It was like an unseen mountain fell on him from thin air. Chu Chen’s body had been forcefully pushed to the ground by that great pressure.

‘What’s going on? Could it be that flying is prohibited in the Black Fog Valley?’

Chu Chen, who crashed pathetically at the entrance of the valley, had been shocked. He struggled to stand up and tried to flap his wings, to have tested his theory.

Right now, he had already been inside the Black Fog Valley. However, despite the magical mist of this special place having little effect on him, the airspace had been filled with some terrifying pressure that permeated the region. That pressure prevented him from flying, forcing him to move forward one step at a time.

Meanwhile, with every step that was taken, that horrible pressure in the air grew stronger. Even with the nigh impenetrable body of the eaglet clone felt suffocated.

‘What kind of place is this…I was not aware of this when my soul travelled past here to the celestial mountain. Now that I’m here in another form, this pressure is just terrifying! As expected…treasures are not so easily obtained!’

Chu Chen looked up slightly and peered into the distance.

In his view, the ancient celestial mountain that was covered in layers of inky black clouds far away had been like an eternal monument that stood tall between heaven and earth, holding everything in its place!

Meanwhile, white bones could be seen littered everywhere along the path leading up to that ancient celestial mountain. Within those skeletal remains, few tufts of spiritual herbs could be seen, dotting the landscape. 

Chu Chen’s pupils contracted slightly.

He noticed that within his line of sight was a unique bright green glimmer of a storage ring. It sat quietly about a thousand feet away from him, unmoving, giving off an aura of righteousness.

‘T-t-that’s the Crystal Spring Sect’s founder, Ancestor Crystal Spring’s storage ring, the Ring of Green Fortune Emperor!’

‘Oh my goodness, it’s only a thousand feet away!’

The founding ancestor had been prepared to explore the Black Fog Valley and would have certainly prepared a lot of good stuff in that ring. Unfortunately, he met his demise after merely venturing at a thousand feet.

‘T-t-this is as though the great ancestor is specially saving this gift for me. Since the others can’t get to it, I might as well help myself.’

In that instant, it was as though he had been on steroids. He excitedly rushed towards it while having resisted the great pressure.

‘Just a thousand feet…once I cross the distance, I’ll be able to get the Crystal Spring Sect’s founder’s storage ring! I wonder how much treasure is in there?’

Even if the treasures in there were insignificant, just having taken them out would have surely caused quite a stir.

Very soon, Chu Chen realized that his thoughts were too naive.

In just a few steps, the oppressive pressure in the air had already been pushing him to the point where he could no longer have endured it.

That was the law of Black Fog Valley. The deeper one ventured, the greater the formless pressure. Without a certain level of cultivation, it had been impossible to enter.

It was just a distance of a thousand feet, yet at that moment, it had been an impassable barrier blocking Chu Chen’s path!