512: Chapter 512 Mere Favors

Inside Star Pivot Hall, two currents of aura—one red and one blue—were still clashing against each other.

Su Ming stood up, following the invisible lifting force. He lowered his hands, still maintaining an extremely respectful posture.

It wasn't for free.

This sentence didn't make Su Ming feel uneasy; instead, it made him feel a bit more grounded. In the Cultivation World, the most frightening thing was a gift without reason. Because free things often required one's life to pay back.

Having a price instead showed that this was a bearable Karma.

Master Xuan Heng looked at the clarity quickly returning to Su Ming's eyes, and a flash of hard-to-detect appreciation flickered deep in his gaze.

He slowly closed the lids of the two jade boxes again.

"Clack."

The cold air and heat waves were sealed away by the Array Patterns once more. The temperature inside the hall finally returned to normal.

Ying poked half a head out from Su Ming's collar, looking at the jade boxes on the table with lingering fear before quickly shrinking back.

Master Xuan Heng put his hands behind his back and walked to the star map, his back turned to Su Ming.

"This Revered Master has lived for two hundred and thirty-seven years," Master Xuan Heng's voice echoed in the empty hall, carrying a sense of vicissitude settled by time. "As the Peak Revered Master of the Cloud Hidden Sect's Formation Peak, in these two hundred-plus years, I've helped people set up Formations, repair Formations, break Formations... I've seen all sorts of people."

Su Ming listened quietly, even keeping his breathing very light.

Inside the xuantian ring, Lin Yu's soul body hovered in the Void Realm. At this moment, he had also rarely put away his playfulness.

"We Formation Masters are not as decisive in killing as Sword Cultivators, nor are we pampered by all sides like Alchemist Cultivators." Master Xuan Heng turned around and pointed at the jade box on the table containing the nine nether mysterious lotus. "But as long as one's craft is refined enough, someone will always come begging to us at a critical moment of life and death. Naturally, someone will always owe a favor."

Master Xuan Heng's finger lightly tapped the lid of the deep blue jade box twice.

"Twenty years ago, Elder Cui Yan of the Sect's Law Enforcement Hall led a team to hunt down an Evil Cultivator and accidentally fell into an ancient Forbidden Ground in the Far North Ice Field."

"The maze Formation in that Forbidden Ground had already mutated; those who entered faced certain death. At that time, Cui Yan was trapped for a full half-month. The accompanying Disciples were completely wiped out, and even her own natal Flying Sword was broken. At the final moment, she used a secret technique to copy a corner of the Forbidden Ground's Array Patterns and sent it back to the Sect."

Master Xuan Heng's tone was very flat, as if he were telling a small matter that had nothing to do with him.

"During those three months, I stayed in secluded meditation, exhausting ten years of my Lifespan to remotely deduce the path to the Gate of Life in that mutated Array Pattern without even being present."

Su Ming gasped.

Remotely deducing an ancient mutated Formation? This not only required terrifyingly profound Formation attainment but also needed an incredibly vast Divine Sense to support it. Exhausting ten years of Lifespan was definitely not just a casual remark.

"Cui Yan followed the Gate of Life I deduced and saved her life." Master Xuan Heng looked at the jade box. "She owed me a life. Ten days ago, I used this favor to exchange for this nine nether mysterious lotus she brought back from the depths of the ice field back then."

Su Ming's heart felt as if it had been struck hard by a heavy hammer.

The life-saving grace of a Nascent Soul Stage Elder! Such a favor, if kept until a great Sect catastrophe or a moment of life and death, would be enough to exchange for unimaginable protection.

And Master Xuan Heng had casually used it for a main ingredient for a Foundation Establishment Stage Disciple.

Master Xuan Heng ignored Su Ming's shock, his finger moving to the crimson jade box containing the phoenix nirvana branch.

"As for Zhou Tong of the Foreign Affairs Department..."

Hearing this name, Su Ming's heart stirred. When he was handing over clues about Evil Cultivators in the Daxing Kingdom capital, he had met that Supervisor Zhou.

"When Zhou Tong was young, he had a fiery temper and caused a big trouble. He was hunted across ten thousand miles by three enemies of the same rank. When he escaped back to the Sect, he only had one breath left. He was about to be intercepted and killed outside the mountain gate."

Master Xuan Heng's eyes glazed over slightly, as if recalling the scene from back then.

"I happened to be passing by and found him somewhat agreeable. So I casually set up a high-level concealment Formation, completely erasing his aura from the world, forcing those three enemies to search the place where he was hiding for three days and three nights, only to return empty-handed."

"He used this phoenix nirvana branch, which he had cherished for nearly a hundred years, to repay the favor from back then."

Master Xuan Heng finished speaking.

The hall was so quiet that a pin drop could be heard.

Su Ming stood there, feeling that the two jade boxes had suddenly become as heavy as a thousand tons.

He knew that the favors these high-level Cultivators owed and acknowledged were never as simple as "casually setting up a Formation." They must have involved danger, calculation, and even life-risking confrontations.

Lin Yu hovered in the xuantian ring for a long time, his originally flowing deep blue luster becoming extremely stagnant.

After a long time, Lin Yu let out a low sigh. His voice was several times heavier than usual: "This Revered Master of yours... is truly protecting you as his true legacy successor."

Su Ming took a deep breath, clasped his hands again, and bowed deeply.

This time, he didn't speak, using only the most standard etiquette to express the shock in his heart.

"Enough." Master Xuan Heng waved his hand, interrupting Su Ming's movement. "You are this Revered Master's Disciple. Taking pains for you is part of my duty."

Master Xuan Heng walked back to the wooden chair and sat down, picking up the long-cold teacup and taking a sip.

"Besides, these favors would just sit there otherwise." Master Xuan Heng's tone remained calm, clearly not wanting Su Ming to carry too much of a psychological burden.

He Put down the teacup， His gaze sharpened.

"But that last ingredient, the ten-thousand-year void azure stone marrow, this Revered Master does not have."

Su Ming looked up, his expression solemn: "Please advise me, Revered Master."

"In this region of the Northern Border, this thing cannot be found." Master Xuan Heng stood up and walked to the star map again.

He waved his wide sleeve.

The light spots in the star map that were originally moving on fixed orbits suddenly changed drastically. Most of the light spots scattered to the sides, and in the very center of the star map, a massive, extremely dense, and dazzlingly bright star belt slowly emerged.

"Central Continent," Master Xuan Heng uttered two words.

Su Ming's gaze was firmly attracted by that brilliant star belt.

"The Central Continent is the absolute center of the entire Human Race's Cultivation World." Master Xuan Heng's finger traced a huge circle in the void. "The Northern Border, Southern Marches, Eastern Sea, and Western Regions. These four borders surround the Central Continent like stars around the moon."

"But the path between the four borders and the Central Continent is not unobstructed. In between lie natural chasms—either endless Thunderbolt Seas or Spirit-Severing Miasmas that swallow Divine Sense. Ordinary teleportation arrays simply cannot directly cross such distances."

Master Xuan Heng's finger pointed at a bright spot representing the junction of the Northern Border and the Central Continent.

"The only safe passage from the Northern Border to the Central Continent is held in the hands of the Qingming Sword Sect."

The scene outside Iron Wall Pass instantly flashed through Su Ming's mind.

In that sky full of wind and snow, a green sword light hovered high in the air, like a rainstorm flowing backward, a terrifying scene where hundreds of millions of Dark Gold Insect Swarms were completely annihilated within three breaths.

"That Sword Venerable at Iron Wall Pass!" Su Ming blurted out.

"Correct." Master Xuan Heng nodded slightly. "That person is Sword Venerable Duan Yue of the Qingming Sword Sect. You have seen him take action from a distance. However, Sword Venerable Duan Yue is only the guardian stationed in the Northern Border by the Qingming Sword Sect; he does not concern himself with such mundane matters."

Master Xuan Heng looked at the star map, his tone carrying a trace of complex emotion.

"The Qingming Sword Sect is the Holy Land for Sword Cultivators in the world. In terms of individual combat power, they are unsurpassed across the Five Borders. They have top experts stationed in the Southern Marches, Eastern Sea, and Northern Border. You can slowly learn about the intricate entanglements of these forces in the Scripture Pavilion later. You are already a True Disciple; in the future, you will inevitably come into contact with struggles at these levels."