Terran Guardian - Chapter 3742

Chapter 3718 Changes in the Heavenly Dao Divine Stele

“Fellow Daoist Ming!”

Shen Changqing returned the greeting with a cupped hand.

Ming Xin glanced at the numerous cultivators following behind Shen Changqing, his expression shifting slightly.

“I’ve long heard of the many geniuses of the Xuan Tian Dao Sect, and seeing them today confirms it. Fellow Daoist Shen, you must have come for the Heavenly Dao Divine Stele!”

“Indeed.”

Shen Changqing nodded, then changed the subject.

“However, I’m new to the Heavenly Dao Immortal City, so I’ve come to the Taiyi Holy Land to rent a suitable immortal abode…”

“Renting an immortal abode is simple; I can make the arrangements. This time, all immortal abode fees will be discounted by 10%, as a token of my sincerity!”

“Then thank you very much, Fellow Daoist Ming.”

Shen Changqing didn’t refuse Ming Xin’s kindness; the other party clearly wanted to build a closer relationship, and he wouldn’t turn him away.

Soon, Ming Xin

completed all the formalities.

For Immortal King Realm cultivators, Shen Changqing rented Yellow-Rank Immortal Abodes for them, while Ancient Immortal Realm cultivators all rented Profound-Rank Immortal Abodes.

Of course,

Shen Changqing himself also resided in a Profound-Rank Immortal Abode.

The reason was simple.

Earth-rank and Heaven-rank immortal abodes are all priced with top-grade immortal stones.

Shen Changqing currently possesses so many top-grade immortal stones that he’d practically split each one in two, so naturally, he wouldn’t be willing to rent an immortal abode of this level.

There’s another reason.

For Shen Changqing, his cultivation has already reached the pinnacle of Immortal Emperor, and he has even comprehended the Dao of Longevity.

Once the Great Tribulation arrives, he can immediately attain the Half-Saint realm.

At this point,

renting either a Profound-rank or Earth-rank immortal abode is essentially meaningless.

Rather than wasting these immortal stones, it’s better to simply rent a Profound-rank immortal abode.

Of course,

even Yellow-rank and Profound-rank immortal abodes are incredibly expensive.

The former costs ten high-grade immortal stones per hundred years, and the latter costs one hundred high-grade immortal stones per hundred years.

Such rental prices are astronomical for most cultivators.

But Shen Changqing has a large number of high-grade immortal stones, so he doesn’t care about such a small amount.

Besides,

they are all sect prodigies.

As the sect leader, he couldn’t be too stingy.

Afterwards,

Shen Changqing led his disciples to their immortal abode.

…

“Hiss, this is a Yellow-Rank Immortal Abode! No wonder it’s worth ten high-grade immortal stones for a hundred years. This cultivation environment is truly unmatched anywhere else!”

Inside a Yellow-Rank Immortal Abode, Xiao Ling felt the terrifying immortal energy permeating the entire abode. He took a casual breath, and there were faint signs of breaking through to the Ancient Immortal Realm.

However,

Xiao Ling forcefully suppressed the urge to break through.

If he truly broke through to the Ancient Immortal Realm, he would lose the greatest opportunity of this trip.

After all,

once he advanced to the Ancient Immortal Realm,

Xiao Ling wouldn’t naively believe that with his initial Ancient Immortal cultivation, he would be qualified to compete for a spot on the Ancient Immortal Stele.

For other cultivators, breaking through a realm was already a stroke of luck.

But Xiao Ling knew very well that if he broke through to the Ancient Immortal Realm now, he would probably only be able to break through to the Immortal Emperor Realm at most. To advance further to the Half-Saint Realm, while not entirely impossible, the probability would be greatly reduced.

The strong always get stronger!

Only by seizing opportunities step by step can one have the chance to go higher.

Being greedy for momentary gains is tantamount to destroying one’s foundation.

Moreover, for Xiao Ling, breaking through to the Ancient Immortal Realm has never been difficult.

If he wanted to, he could have done so millions of years ago.

The reason he hadn’t broken through was that Xiao Ling was waiting for an opportunity, a chance to further enhance his foundation.

Now,

he has arrived at the Heavenly Dao Immortal City, and everything is right before his eyes. Why would Xiao Ling break through at this time?

Therefore,

seeing that his cultivation was about to break through, Xiao Ling naturally suppressed his cultivation to the greatest extent possible, preventing it from truly breaking through.

Under this full suppression, he felt that his immortal power was also undergoing some subtle transformation.

This discovery

filled Xiao Ling with joy once again.

“I thought my immortal power condensation had reached its limit, but now it seems there’s still room for further improvement.

However, the immortal energy environment within the sect wasn’t as good as in this immortal abode. Once my immortal energy reached a certain level, it became difficult to progress any further.

Being able to cultivate in a Yellow-Rank Immortal Abode is an immense opportunity.

If I can truly compress and condense my immortal power to its limit, my chances of ascending the Immortal King’s Stele will be even higher!”

Xiao Ling thought

to himself. He was actually quite confident in his ability to ascend the Immortal King’s Stele.

Condensing his immortal power now naturally increased his chances.

There was another point.

As for ascending the Immortal King’s Stele, ranking was crucial.

As far as he knew, the current Dan Peak Master had once reached the top three on the Immortal King’s Stele, receiving unparalleled fortune, and was now one of the most outstanding geniuses in the sect.

Even those with other innate immortal bodies were weaker than him.

Clearly,

the higher the ranking on the Immortal King’s Stele, the greater the fortune.

Xiao Ling was certain he wasn’t weaker than others.

Even if he didn’t have an innate immortal body, so what?

Ye Yun, the disciple from Danfeng, had also ascended the Immortal King Stele with a mortal body, achieving a very high ranking.

With these thoughts in mind, Xiao Ling seized the opportunity to further refine his immortal power, aiming to truly reach the limits of the Immortal King realm and challenge for an even higher ranking on the Immortal King Stele.

Meanwhile,

the other disciples of the Xuan Tian Dao Sect were also cultivating with all their might.

The Yellow-Rank Immortal Mansion possessed astonishingly abundant immortal energy; cultivating in such a place allowed for rapid advancement in cultivation.

Almost all the Immortal King realm disciples did not choose to break through to the Ancient Immortal Realm at this moment, but instead followed Xiao Ling’s example, refining their immortal power to prepare for their subsequent attempt to reach the Immortal King Stele.

As fellow sect prodigies, all at the peak of the Immortal King realm, none believed they would fall behind.

Therefore…

Even though they knew the difficulty of ascending the Immortal King Stele was immense, they still exerted all their efforts to improve their strength.

As for breaking through to the Ancient Immortal Realm at this critical juncture, that would be the most foolish thing to do.

To put it bluntly,

even if they truly wanted to break through to the Ancient Immortal Realm, they should first go to the Immortal King Stele.

But the disciples in the Ancient Immortal Realm were different.

Even cultivators like Ji Yang and Gu Qingyang, who had already broken through to the half-step Immortal Emperor Realm, couldn’t truly break through to the Immortal Emperor Realm in an instant.

Admittedly,

the immortal energy in the Profound-rank Immortal Mansion was abundant, many times stronger than that of the Yellow-rank Immortal Mansion.

But the breakthrough from Ancient Immortal to Immortal Emperor Realm was not something that could be achieved simply by having enough immortal energy.

Therefore,

at this time, they didn’t have the worry of breaking through, but instead used the immortal energy of the Profound-rank Immortal Mansion to cultivate silently and improve their strength.

It could be said that

now that they had entered the Heavenly Dao Immortal City, no one was in a hurry to go to the Heavenly Dao Divine Stele, but instead all went into seclusion to cultivate and improve their strength.

Shen Changqing naturally saw this.

In fact…

Before moving into the Immortal Abode, he had already instructed the other sect disciples to cultivate with all their might until their cultivation could no longer be suppressed, or until they had enough confidence, before heading to the Heavenly Dao Divine Stele to compete for ranking opportunities.

Until then,

they only needed to cultivate in seclusion within the Immortal Abode.

As for the immortal stones needed for cultivation, Shen Changqing covered all of them.

The disciples rented over a hundred Immortal Abodes, and over a hundred years, the total rental cost would be at most two or three thousand high-grade immortal stones.

This was naturally insignificant to Shen Changqing.

Even if they stayed for ten thousand years, it would only amount to two or three hundred thousand high-grade immortal stones.

Not to mention anything else, the high-grade immortal stones from the Longevity Immortal Mine alone would be enough for Shen Changqing to keep these disciples in the Heavenly Dao Immortal City forever.

Therefore,

Shen Changqing never considered the issue of high-grade immortal stones.

A month later,

Mingxin came to visit.

Upon learning this, Shen Changqing invited him into the Immortal Abode.

Inside the Immortal Abode…

The two sat facing each other. Shen Changqing flicked his sleeve, and teaware appeared. He then began to brew immortal tea for his companion.

Each cup contained only a single tea leaf, floating forlornly, appearing rather plain.

But Mingxin, staring at that single leaf, suddenly narrowed his eyes, seemingly shocked and incredulous.

“A hazy Buddhist light…the manifestation of the Great Dao…this is Bodhi Heartless Tea!!”

Shen Changqing smiled faintly. “Fellow Daoist Ming is knowledgeable; indeed, this is Bodhi Heartless Tea!”

Hearing this,

Mingxin took a deep breath, his shock barely diminishing.

“Ordinary Bodhi Heartless Tea would never possess such power of rules and Daoist principles. Fellow Daoist, the quality of your Bodhi Heartless Tea is certainly extraordinary.

May I ask, whose Daoist principle transformed this?”

“I do not know the name of that senior, only that he was a Great Sage!”

Shen Changqing shook his head, refraining from mentioning the Great Sage of Crossing Calamity.

The latter’s demise, transforming into a Great Sage Immortal Mine, was something the fewer people who knew, the better.

As for taking out a piece of Bodhi Heartless Tea, Shen Changqing didn’t care much.

After all, while there weren’t many powerful Buddhist and Taoist figures in the world, there were still quite a few, and countless Great Sages of Buddhism and Taoism had appeared throughout history.

Most of these beings had perished countless ages ago, so it wasn’t surprising that Bodhi Heartless Tea, imbued with their Daoist essence, circulated in the world.

Sure enough.

Mingxin didn’t doubt Shen Changqing’s words. He saw the other party solemnly taste a sip, his expression somewhat intoxicated, as if he were comprehending the supreme Daoist essence within.

After an unknown amount of time, Mingxin finally awoke from that reverie.

“What a wonderful immortal tea transformed from the Daoist essence of a Great Sage! Fellow Daoist Shen has offered such a precious treasure; I am unworthy to accept it!”

Mingxin looked at the half-cup of immortal tea remaining in his cup, his gratitude evident.

Shen Changqing smiled faintly: “Fellow Daoist, there’s no need for such politeness.”   He paused, then changed the subject and asked

.   ”Fellow Daoist, you’ve resided in the Divine Sun Domain for many years. How much do you know about the current state of the Heavenly Dao Divine Stele?”   ”The Heavenly Dao Divine Stele?”   Mingxin’s expression faltered slightly, then he understood Shen Changqing’s meaning, and his face immediately turned serious.   ”Speaking of the Heavenly Dao Divine Stele, in recent years, the number of geniuses in the Nine Heavens Immortal Realm has been steadily increasing.   Especially with the forces of the Three Thousand Great Universes intervening, the competition for the Heavenly Dao Divine Stele has become increasingly fierce.   Taking the Immortal King Stele as an example, in most of the past, geniuses who could overcome the Eternal Immortal King Tribulation could have their names inscribed there.   But now, it’s different—” (End of Chapter)