520: Chapter 520 The Rules of Zhongzhou

Daoist Xuanming glanced at Ming Yue and replied,

"Who told you that cultivation must rely on the free-floating Spiritual Qi in this world?"

Su Ming pondered and asked, "Senior, could it be that Cultivators in Central Province rely on Spirit Stones for cultivation?"

Upon hearing this, Daoist Xuanming’s wide sleeves shook slightly, and a faint spiritual light flashed.

There was a soft "clack."

A stone the size of a fingernail, emitting a faint white light, traced an arc through the air and landed precisely at the bow of the boat.

Su Ming's eyes narrowed slightly. Without using any spiritual power, he relied purely on the strength of his Physical Body to steadily extend his right hand and catch the stone in his palm.

This was a Low-Grade Spirit Stone. In the Cloud Hidden Sect, it was the lowest form of hard currency; Su Ming had at least tens of thousands of them in his Storage Pouch.

"Try it," Daoist Xuanming said, standing where he was with his chin slightly raised, gesturing to Su Ming.

Su Ming looked down at the Spirit Stone in his palm.

He didn't act immediately. Instead, he used his Divine Sense to scan the Spirit Stone three times from inside out, confirming there were no tracking spells or toxins attached to it.

Only then did Su Ming close his eyes, channeling a strand of extremely gentle spiritual power along the Meridians in his palm to slowly probe into that Low-Grade Spirit Stone.

In the Northern Territory, it was extremely simple for Cultivators to absorb Spirit Stones. They only needed to use spiritual power as a catalyst to extract the Spiritual Qi from within the stone, like peeling silk from a cocoon, and guide it along their Meridians into their Dantian.

However, the instant Su Ming's spiritual power touched the core of the Spirit Stone,

a faint luster lit up on the stone's surface.

Immediately after, the Spiritual Qi Su Ming had drawn out acted like snow exposed to a scorching sun. Before it could even travel along his Meridians, it dissipated directly into the air at an inconceivable speed!

Su Ming snapped his eyes open.

He looked at the Spirit Stone in his palm, its luster once again dimmed, and a flash of unconcealable shock crossed his eyes.

"It dissipated?" Qing Feng stood not far away, clearly having noticed the fleeting flash of Spiritual Qi.

"That's right, it dissipated." Daoist Xuanming let out a dry laugh. He walked slowly to the side of the boat, looking down at the vast land below. "Now, do you understand the rules of Central Province?"

The air on the flying boat seemed to become even more oppressive due to the dissipation of that Spirit Stone's energy.

Su Ming curled his fingers, clutching the Low-Grade Spirit Stone in his palm. He didn't try to extract the spiritual power again. Instead, relying on his Late Foundation Establishment Stage sensitivity to Qi, he quickly retraced the process of that dissipation in his mind.

The Spiritual Qi hadn't entered his Meridians; the moment it escaped the confinement of the Spirit Stone, it was directly devoured by the surrounding, extremely "thirsty" Laws of the world.

"The natural environment is like a giant, parched funnel," Su Ming mused internally, his brow furrowed tightly. "In this environment, any masterless spiritual power not completely locked down by a Formation or Meridians will be instantly assimilated by the world."

"Do you understand now?" Daoist Xuanming asked, turning his head.

Su Ming bowed slightly. "This Junior is dull-witted. It seems this world is rejecting the direct absorption of Spiritual Qi?"

"It's not rejection; it's plunder." Daoist Xuanming retracted his gaze, his voice cold and devoid of warmth. "The Spiritual Qi in Central Province is too thin. The Laws of the world themselves crave spiritual power. When you use the breathing techniques of the Northern Territory to extract from a Spirit Stone, the overflowing Spiritual Qi isn't even enough to fill the gaps between this world's teeth."

His withered finger tapped lightly on the wooden edge of the flying boat.

"Therefore, in Central Province, every Cultivator knows a basic piece of common sense." Daoist Xuanming paused for a breath. "The spiritual power within a Spirit Stone must never be absorbed directly. It must pass through a specific conversion Formation, with the Spirit Stone placed in the Formation eye. By utilizing the Spirit-Locking and conversion effects of the Array Patterns, the spiritual power is guided into the Cultivator's body without a single drop being lost."

Su Ming's heart skipped a beat.

Back at the Cloud Hidden Sect, whether for daily cultivation or recovery during battle, he had always held Spirit Stones in his hands to absorb them directly. While that method resulted in a small amount of Spiritual Qi escaping, it was inconsequential when surrounded by the rich Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi of the Northern Territory.

It turned out that in Central Province, even the most basic cultivation had to rely on Formations.

"Spirit-Locking, conversion, guidance..." Within Su Ming's Sea of Consciousness, those seven hundred and fifty shimmering Array Talismans began to circulate instinctively. In a very short time, he constructed the skeletons of three micro-Formations in his mind that could achieve this effect.

But he said nothing, silently tucking the Spirit Stone into his sleeve.

Ying seemed to sense the subtle fluctuation in Su Ming's emotions. It poked its head out from his collar, its golden pupils darting around as it stared warily at the gray sky, occasionally letting out an extremely low hiss.

"Then... what happens if one has no Spirit Stones?" Qing Feng swallowed hard, his voice carrying a hint of fear toward the unknown future.

He had calculated the assets in his Storage Pouch; it was only a few hundred Low-Grade Spirit Stones. At this rate of consumption, requiring a Formation just to Cultivate, he feared he wouldn't even last a month.

Daoist Xuanming glanced at Qing Feng with a look one might give an unweaned child.

"No Spirit Stones?" Daoist Xuanming sneered, his raspy voice echoing across the boat. "Then go earn them. The Wanbao Tower, the Baibao Pavilion, the Loose Cultivator Alliance, or even recruitment as a Guest Elder for those great clans... Central Province is full of ways to earn Spirit Stones. As long as you have a craft—be it Alchemy, drawing talismans, setting Formations, or even just taming Spirit Beasts—there are plenty of Spirit Stones waiting for you."

The old man leaned forward slightly, his eyes becoming extremely sharp, like the edge of a blade.

"And if you can't earn them?" He stared at Qing Feng's pale face and said word by word, "Then go steal them. Go to the wilderness outside the cities, to the edges of those ungoverned Secret Realms, and kill for loot. Strip their skins and pluck their tendons. Seize every resource that can keep you alive."

"If you can't even manage to steal..." Daoist Xuanming straightened up, putting his hands behind his back again as his tone returned to its stagnant, dead-water calm. "Then you can only accept your fate. Become a withered corpse on this land of Central Province that even wild dogs would despise."

Earn. Steal. Accept your fate.

Five simple words laid the bloody rules of the Cultivation World bare before the three young people who had grown up in the comfortable Sects of the Northern Territory.

There was a deathly silence on the flying boat.

Ming Yue's face was ashen, and she instinctively shrank behind Qing Feng. Qing Feng's hands and feet were also ice-cold, and he bit his lower lip hard.

Su Ming remained standing where he was, not even blinking.

During his years in the mortal world of the Daxing Kingdom, when he crawled out of piles of corpses, he had already experienced malice far more direct than this. Central Province simply took that malice and quantified it to the extreme using the absolute yardstick of "Spirit Stones."

"What this fellow says may be unpleasant, but the logic is sound."

Lin Yu's soul body let out a long sigh within the xuantian ring. His usual playfulness was gone, replaced by a rare trace of heaviness on his thin face.