Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Observing the unusual jade pendant up close by hiding himself with his domain before approaching, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more interested in the origin of this jade pendant, as on surface, he noticed several engravings that didn’t belong to the current age in the ancient language that he was still in the process of learning. Meaning that the jade pendant itself was old, or rather ancient. Likely having existed for far longer than Li Feng’s family clan had.

That or the Li Clan were descendants from some ancient cultivation clan that had slowly lost their inheritance through the passage of time until they reached their current point where the strongest members of the Li Clan had only barely reached the Nascent Soul Realm.

Although it was unlikely, it wasn’t impossible and as he began scouring through the library and archives of the Li Clan, he did find several records and books that shouldn’t exist inside a small cultivation clan like the Li Clan, some even containing information about the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm. The only reason why these pieces of information didn’t seem to have garnered much attention being that they weren’t written in the current language and would be impossible to understand without any knowledge of the ancient language that preceded the current dominant language on the Ewaria Continent.

Of course, this information didn’t directly mean that the Li Clan did in fact descend from some kind of ancient cultivation clan, as there was still a very real possibility that some ancestor or lucky individual from the Li Clan had stumbled on the ancient records and books in the past while exploring ancient ruins and ended up placing them inside the clan library or archives.

The only reason why Xuan Hao himself thought that this was unlikely had to do with the sheer quantity of ancient information that existed within the Li Clan, as it didn’t just contain a bit of information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm, but instead contained a direct cultivation path from the Qi Condensation Realm all the way up to the Land Creation Realm, with only information on the Star Creation Realm that came after missing.

Information that was so detailed that it directly helped his own understanding of the different cultivation realms deepen.

The most important piece of information being on the Sea Formation and Land Creation Realm of the Profound Immortal Realm, as it contained information he had been seeking regarding ways to expand the landmass and how to ensure a safe breakthrough to the Land Creation Realm by using different heavenly and earthly treasures.

Utilizing these heavenly and earthly treasures to stabilize the landmass during an early breakthrough to the Land Creation Realm before reaching the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm or to further expand the landmass after reaching the Land Creation Realm without causing any problems that could end up causing damage to one’s foundation.

One thing he did notice was that there was no mention of certain special artifacts that could achieve the same. Meaning that he might need to look elsewhere for that kind of information or the special artifacts that people like the Ancestor of the Wei Empire used to reach the Land Creation Realm had some flaws in them that didn’t exist with those heavenly and earthly treasures mentioned in the ancient texts inside the Li Clan’s archive.

Although, one problem he did find regarding those heavenly and earthly treasures was the simple fact that he didn’t recognize even one of the ones that had been mentioned within those ancient texts. Meaning that their names had either changed over the years or they were rare to the point that even someone like himself who knew about a large number of unique spiritual herbs and special spiritual treasures naturally formed thanks to information directly granted to him through the system in the past when he had his alchemist rank promoted through its help, had never heard about them before.

And… Unfortunate as it was, he leaned towards it being the second reason, as he had a feeling that those kinds of special heavenly and earthly treasures were difficult beyond belief to obtain even in the ancient times, let alone the current world that was far worse when it came to giving birth to those kinds of special heavenly and earthly treasures.

Even if they did end up emerging, they wouldn’t appear in places like the Northern Central Region and would most likely appear in a place with far richer spiritual qi like the Southern Central Region.

Thinking about it, this might be one of the reasons why every major power ended up moving to the Southern Central Region after growing to a certain level, outside of the direct threats to do so.

After all, there had to be a reason why Star Creation Realm cultivators were so rare outside of the Southern Central Region beyond just a slightly better cultivation environment… And these heavenly and earthly treasures might be one such reason.

But aside from this valuable information that he had managed to get his hands on while searching through the records of the Li Clan to find out whether they had descended from an ancient cultivation clan or not, Xuan Hao did also manage to find a clue that could potentially answer this question, as it was a small ancient record that detailed when the Li Clan had settled down in the current location and where they had come from earlier.

The information itself wasn’t the most detailed and only contained general descriptions of the place they had lived beforehand, but from this information, he could at least guess to some extent that the original Li Clan seemed to have lived inside some kind of ancient secret realm or mystical realm before they had been forced to leave the place for unknown reasons.

All this pointing once more towards the Li Clan having descended from an ancient cultivation clan, though all information beyond them having originally come from some kind of ancient secret realm or mystical realm had been lost. The remaining texts, having long since decayed to a point where they were unreadable.

Still, with knowledge about the past of the Li Clan, he could to some extent draw out a general direction of the Li Clan’s movement and where the ancient secret realm or mystical realm they had emerged from was located.

Even if the general location covered a vast area unimaginable to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm like the Li Clan Ancestors who might have thought about exploring their origins in the past, it wouldn’t take much for someone at the Land Creation Realm to search through such a wide area… And with his powerful divine sense, he should be able to find any traces that might have been left behind by an ancient gate to a secret realm or mystic realm.

Concealment formations were a real possibility, but with his current attainments in the Dao of Formations and Dao of Illusions to help him, he felt confident that he would be able to sense anything. Especially an ancient concealment formation whose state would undoubtedly have worsened over the years without anyone to help maintain it.

From originally having been deeply interested in the jade pendent of the potential disciple Li Feng, Xuan Hao’s interest had entirely shifted away from him and the jade pendent and instead turned towards uncovering the past and origin of the Li Clan itself.

Of course, it wasn’t that he had lost interest in Li Feng, it was just that the background of the Li Clan was far more important to him, as the information he had managed to obtain so far had directly helped increase his own knowledge of the Land Creation Realm and even pointed out a path for him to further increase his strength that didn’t rely on him having to reach an ungodly level of comprehension.

In fact, after learning about the existence of heavenly and earthly materials useful for expanding the landmass inside his dantian, he had already partly determined that this should be the original way to progress through the Land Creation Realm, as relying entirely on comprehension to reach the Middle Stage of the Land Creation Realm was downright insane.

Not just because it would require potentially reaching the Origin Realm in comprehension of several Daos, but also because of how difficult reaching the Land Creation Realm would be in the past without the assistance of these heavenly and earthly treasures, as not everyone would have been able to reach the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm like he had.

Because of all this, exploring the past of the Li Clan became an immediate priority; while taking on another disciple could wait a bit as he soon enough set off to search for the ancient secret realm or mystic realm that the Li Clan had originally come from. Leaving behind a trace of his divine sense to keep an eye on Li Feng, or more specifically the jade pendant he was carrying.