https://novelcool.info/chapter/Chapter-346-The-Ancient-Han-Dynasty-Still-Thriving-Part-2-/12598083/
https://novelcool.info/chapter/Chapter-348-Layer-Four-of-the-Eightfold-Heaven-the-Upper-Realm-of-the-Divine-Court-Part-1-/12598085/
Chapter 347: The Difficulty and Advancement of Divine Arts
Chapter 347: The Difficulty and Advancement of Divine Arts
After reading the three divination lots, Lei Jun had a general idea.
The difference between a moderately good lot and a moderately-moderately good lot lay in time.
Fang Yue's journey to the cave dwelling named Dongyang Byeyuan probably didn't take place during the Mid-Autumn season, so his findings were limited.
However, on every Mid-Autumn day, there might be some additional changes in that place.
But on the other hand, Fang Yue had already cultivated the Confucian art of reciting to the state of spiritual transcendence. This cultivation path was superior to the communication between the divine soul and the heavens and the perception of the four directions. The mysteries of Dongyang Byeyuan were able to escape his notice, which showed that it was no small matter.
"The Great Han Dynasty... I am interested in this matter. There is no need to compensate with anything else. Solely based on this incident, I am willing to exchange it for the Six Yang Essences." Lei Jun spoke.
Fang Yue said, "Thank you, my lord. There is one thing I need to inform you about in advance. In order to pass through this spiritual object to Dongyang Byeyuan, one must be stimulated by the Confucian righteous qi to open the void portal. Whether other cultivation paths can do the same, I cannot be sure. If you find it inconvenient to open, please feel free to contact me again."
"Very well, you are thoughtful indeed." Lei Jun replied.
"In that case, let us arrange a place for me to hand over the spiritual object named Dongyang Jade Pendant." Fang Yue suggested.
After agreeing on a location with Fang Yue, Lei Jun exchanged the Dongyang Jade Pendant for the Six Yang Essences.
With some time still left before the Mid-Autumn day on the 15th of August, Lei Jun had no plans to explore it in advance and remained peacefully on Mount Longhu, with everything as usual.
Before their departure from the mountain, Xu Yuanzhen and Tang Xiaotang had already used the Xuan Darkness Dust, which was born from the Xuan Ling Qi, to refine Cold Flame's soul.
Now that Lei Jun was expanding his outer spiritual realm, he could directly refine Cold Flame's soul and further strengthen his divine soul, building upon the foundation laid by the Forget-Me-Not Smoke from earlier.
The flames, which used to seem capable of freezing and shattering one's divine soul, no longer held any scorching heat at this moment, nor were they as soul-piercingly cold as before.
Lei Jun's divine soul detached from his physical shell and hovered above his body.
The flames, which had never had a definite form, now appeared even more ethereal as they attached themselves to Lei Jun's divine soul.
Lei Jun's divine soul seemed to be burning along with the flames.
As time went on, Lei Jun's divine soul also began to take on an ethereal quality.
This process was repeated several times until the illusory cold flames eventually went out.
At that moment, Lei Jun's divine soul reappeared, looking extremely vivid, as if it were a solid presence, resembling the appearance of a Sun God, which was how a high-level cultivator from the Daoist Elixir Furnace Sect would appear after their original infant emerged from their body and transformed into a Solar Deity.
His divine soul slowly descended and re-entered his physical shell.
"The effect is quite good." Lei Jun nodded slightly.
He focused his thoughts and calmed his mind.
His perception of the outside world remained keen, and on this foundation, his divine soul was tougher and more resilient, making it difficult for enemies to take advantage of him.
Lei Jun gathered his thoughts and continued his cultivation.
Until the Mid-Autumn day of the 15th of August arrived.
Lei Jun did not go down the mountain.
After privately informing Yuan Mobai, Wang Guyuan, and Chu Kun, Lei Jun secluded himself in a quiet room.
He now held a jade pendant in his hand, with a pattern of a rising sun engraved on it.
Lei Jun first nurtured the jade pendant with his own magical powers.
A flash of light seemed to pass through the jade pendant, but there was no further reaction.
Lei Jun remained calm and took out his Hao Ran Mystical Tablet.
Through the transformation of the Hao Ran Mystical Tablet, his magical powers, which originally belonged to the Daoist sect, suddenly gave birth to a vast amount of Confucian righteous qi.
Stimulated by the immense amount of Confucian righteous qi, the Dongyang Jade Pendant finally began to change gradually.
A soft yet brilliant radiance lit up the surface of the jade pendant, like the dawn's first light.
Then, like the sunrise, this radiance grew brighter and more intense.
As the radiance unfolded, a void portal seemed to appear before Lei Jun.
Lei Jun stepped into this void portal.
The radiance before his eyes was no longer as dazzling as looking directly at the sun, but instead, it grew dimmer.
Before Lei Jun, a picturesque scene unfolded: a mountain range with clear waters, and within the mountains, there stood a courtyard with a plaque on its gate that read "Dongyang".
Lei Jun sensed with his mind, and he perceived that there was no one else around.
He entered the houses in the courtyard and looked around. Just as Fang Yue had said, there were very limited useful items.
However, it could be affirmed that this place was not very old.
A few scattered words of useful information all indicated that the master of this byeyuan lived in a world that belonged to the Great Han Dynasty.
But there were no further clues.
The byeyuan was heavy with the aura of culture and refinement, but there were no books left behind, causing Fang Yue's and now Lei Jun's plans to learn about the related history to fall through.
This place indeed seemed like just a casually arranged resting spot for someone.
During his exploration, Lei Jun sensed something unusual with his spiritual awareness, but he couldn't capture it clearly for the time being.
He was neither anxious nor hasty. Calmly, he observed and silently calculated the time.
Outside of this byeyuan, in the real world of the Great Tang Dynasty, it should currently be night, and the full moon should be rising.
The next moment, this byeyuan changed along with the time, as if it had transitioned from day to night.
It was as if the daylight had reached its extreme and transformed into moonlight.
In this ever-bright and mysterious cave, the moonlight also arrived, casting a chilly and lonely ambiance.
Lei Jun sensed something and looked towards the distant horizon.
Then, beyond the mountains, he saw the ocean roaring and flowing.
It seemed as if the moon was rising from the great waves.
The void of this cave heaven was split in two.
On one side were the mountain dwellings, and on the other, the tides rose and fell.
At the same time, Lei Jun heard a distant and melodious voice:
"The bright moon rises over the sea, shared by all under the same sky."
The bright moon rising from the sea merged with the full moon already hanging over Dongyang Byeyuan.
The two separate cave heaven worlds overlapped and united as one.
Lei Jun clearly sensed that two spatial worlds had overlapped and intertwined.
"The bright moon rises over the sea, shared by all under the same sky..." Lei Jun repeated the poem, a smile curving his lips.
He turned his head to the side, and in that moment, as the two worlds united under the same full moon, they shared a moment of togetherness.
And so, they were "shared by all under the same sky."
As Lei Jun's gaze swept the area, he noticed that Dongyang Byeyuan indeed had many more objects than before.
But the most eye-catching of them all was a grave.
The owner of this place had passed away.
Here, in this cave heaven, the owner had prepared a burial place for himself before his death.
No wonder Lei Jun hadn't been able to find the spatial door connecting this cave heaven to the Great Han Dynasty.
It turned out that it was the human world of the Great Tang Dynasty that had unintentionally opened the path to this place.
From what Lei Jun currently understood, it was likely that a jade pendant from this place, influenced by the fluctuating spiritual energy and the changing human world, had accidentally fallen into the human world of the Great Tang Dynasty, where it was then obtained by Fang Yue.
Lei Jun approached the grave and, although they had never met, he offered a Daoist bow to the grave.
There was no tombstone at the grave, so Lei Jun inspected the rest of the courtyard once more, and this time, some books and paintings appeared.
"Wang Xu, styled Minghao, self-proclaimed as Dongyang Shanren..." Lei Jun nodded slightly.
Indeed, this person had never appeared in the historical records of the Great Tang Dynasty.
Among the items that Lei Jun found was the middle-level opportunity mentioned in the divination lot.
It was a large bow.
【The Rising Sun Bow】
To date, it was the most excellent Confucian divine bow that Lei Jun had personally come across, surpassing even those of Ye Mermo of Cangzhou and Lin Yuwei of the Lin Clan of the South Sect, and even outperforming the hunting bow frequently used by Chu Yu.
However, this treasure was only in the context of Confucian divine archers.
Therefore, to Lei Jun, it was of exceptional quality but currently could only be considered a middle-level opportunity.
Together with the bow was a handwritten note that said:
"To the one who comes, it is fate, and I wish you good luck."
Seeing this, Lei Jun couldn't help but chuckle.
He ran his finger along the surface of the bow, his mind swirling with thoughts.
Considering that this place only overlapped with the outside world once a year, making it inconvenient to retrieve items from, Lei Jun temporarily put away the bow.
He bowed once more to the grave, "Thank you, Mr. Wang."
The Mid-Autumn night gradually passed.
When the 16th of August arrived, the scenery within Dongyang Byeyuan changed, and it seemed as if the two worlds were separating once more.
One part faded out of existence.
The remaining parts returned to their usual peaceful but quiet state.
"The mysteries of home and country can still be preserved to this extent after one's passing. This is indeed beyond the capabilities of an Eighth Heaven Confucian," Lei Jun observed without surprise, his thoughts turning to other matters.
There was something unusual about Wang Xu, Minghao, the owner of this place.
Through the spatial door created by the Dongyang Jade Pendant, Lei Jun returned to the human world of the Great Tang Dynasty.
He didn't make a fuss about it and simply kept the Rising Sun Bow and the Dongyang Jade Pendant with him.
In the following days, Lei Tianshi continued his usual routine of cultivating and instructing the youngsters of the manor.
In his free time, Lei Jun's attention turned to the art of artifact crafting.
As Lei Jun's personal strength grew, so did the Yuan Magnetism power that he cultivated.
As a result, the might of his Yuan Magnetism Flying Sword also increased significantly.
However, this gave rise to a problem.
Currently, aside from the Seven Stars Sword, the other artifacts and treasures used for the Yuan Magnetism Flying Sword, including the Xuanjin Sword Pellets, were unable to withstand the tremendous Yuan Magnetism power, leading to acceleration and propulsion issues.
To withstand it, they would need to slow down, requiring Lei Jun to reduce the power output.
But that would mean being unable to deal with higher-level enemies.
He needed more suitable "ammunition" to meet the demands of actual combat against higher-level foes.
Or perhaps, he could develop new divine abilities and techniques.
The Tianhua Falling Iron and the Shenxiao Flowing Gold had yet to be utilized by Lei Jun, and he intended to use them for other projects.
And for the Seven Stars Sword, Lei Jun had more related ideas, and he planned to refine this treasure further once he reached the Ninth Heaven realm.
Similar to the situation with the Yuan Magnetism Flying Sword, there was another aspect to Lei Jun's Heavenly Book's dark side.
All this time, he had been using the dark side of the Heavenly Book to cover his tracks, and it had become quite handy.
This was the case even when he was in Nanzhao, executing Ding Chuan, An Zhiyu, Li Yuanyuan, and the others.
But before that, after the battle in the Western Sichuan Snowy Mountains, when Lei Jun tried to erase the traces left by Huang Xuanpu, it wasn't as smooth as before and even seemed a bit difficult.
Even though Huang Xuanpu was already severely injured after the battle.
It seemed that the dark side of the Heavenly Book also had its limits in this regard.
Lei Jun recalled that when he first obtained the dark side of the Heavenly Book, the fortune had mentioned it was a second-grade opportunity.
So, this development wasn't entirely unexpected.
Anyone with connections to Huang Xuanpu had basically been sent away in advance to await their fate.
The dark side of the Heavenly Book wasn't perfectly effective in cleaning up, but others would find it difficult to detect anything amiss.
That Western White Emperor from the Great Ming Dynasty who had come to the Great Tang Dynasty was obviously not a true ally of Huang Xuanpu's.
Ironically, Huang Xuanpu was also wary of that seemingly like-minded Great Ming Dynasty cultivator and even secretly set up traps for him.
When Huang Xuanpu's identity was exposed and he had to hastily leave the Great Tang territory, he didn't have time to return to the Pure Yang Palace, which left behind some related clues.
Among them was the mention that Huang Xuanpu's imperial title was the Western White Emperor...
But now, through Xue Xingzi and Shang Nan, it could be proven that Huang Xuanpu's imperial title was actually the Northern Black Emperor.
He had been misleading the Great Tang court all along.
Unfortunately, Huang Xuanpu was eventually executed.
When the power of the dark side of the Heavenly Book was used to clean up his traces, it became increasingly inconvenient.
Lei Jun wasn't dissatisfied with this turn of events; he was just considering how to deal with similar situations in the future.
It was during this contemplation of the Heavenly Book's dark side that Lei Jun suddenly discovered that the Dark Yuan Luohu of his Heavenly Book's dark universe had recently made a new move.
Kang Ming and the others were currently in the North Borderlands.
They were displaced and homeless, and although they had captured Han Wuyou alive, the Great Tang court's pursuit of them had not ceased.
Without a sect to rely on, their days were uncertain, and the despair among the remaining Yellow Heaven's Way disciples was growing harder to control by the day.
Fortunately, Kang Ming's trip to the North Borderlands wasn't in vain.
According to Lei Jun's latest information, Kang Ming's wish had come true.
Although the area where they were currently operating was still quite far from where Fang Yue had obtained the Dongyang Jade Pendant, Kang Ming had found another opportunity.
He had obtained a spiritual treasure that had scattered and drifted away from Dongyang Shanren's cemetery after his death due to changes in the void world.
Unlike the Dongyang Jade Pendant, which pointed to Dongyang Shanren's place of seclusion after his death, this spiritual treasure seemed to lead to a more expansive world.
This might indeed give Kang Ming a chance to find a way out of the Great Tang world.
The temporary void portal was highly unstable, as if it could collapse at any moment.
But the crisis faced by the Yellow Heaven's Way was already as bad as it could get.
Kang Ming, Chen Ziyang, and the others had to take this chance and fight their way out.
"Could it be... the human world of the Great Han Dynasty?" Lei Jun wondered, feeling curious but not stopping them.
Whether they would create a new path or perish, it was up to them now.
Lei Jun remained calm and continued his quiet cultivation on Mount Longhu, presiding over the situation.
With the disappearance and destruction of the Yellow Heaven's Way, the Heavenly Master's Mansion had one less concern.
Time passed, and autumn turned to winter.
In the mountains, one was unaware of the passing seasons.
As time went by, Lei Jun approached the age of sixty-two.
During this period, outside of Mount Longhu, Tang Xiaotang ended her visit to the Shu Mountain Sect and headed south to join the Great Tang Dynasty's cultivators and the South Wilderness Shaman Gate. Together, they began to seal the portal connecting the human world to the Sea of Earth.
A great battle erupted between the Great Tang cultivators and the Nine Li people of the Wilderness.
In the rumors, the former Heavenly Master Tang Zhenren fought with the Three Treasures of the Heavenly Master, stunning the crowd and leaving them defeated and disheveled.
With this retreat, the Great Tang cultivators' subsequent efforts to seal the void portal became much smoother.
The Nine Li people's rebellion, which had wreaked havoc in the South Wilderness and affected the human world for a long time, finally came to a temporary halt.
Lei Jun, on the other hand, informed Yuan Mobai that he intended to go into seclusion for quiet cultivation.
With the help of the Taiyu Stone and the numerous spiritual treasures in the Heavenly Master's Mansion, Lei Tian Shi's cultivation base gradually reached a critical point.
When the time was right, he could begin attempting to expand his God's Court outer realm into a God's Court upper realm.
PS: 4k chapter, it's considered a single chapter update, I really can't hold on any longer, feeling that my brain is completely dried up, frequently staring blankly at the computer but unable to write anything, must sleep well, didn't set an alarm for tomorrow morning, apologizing to everyone, single update tonight, will try to resume double updates tomorrow night.
(End of Chapter)
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