Her body began to tremble and spasm in very concerning ways as she turned to face Long Di.

“We need to go right now.”

****

Long Di only stared at her for a quick minute before he turned his attention toward the disciples, the girl included.

When his gaze landed, they inwardly trembled. This boy was a death god! He was more of a demon than the actual demons!

“Leave.”

This was all they wanted to hear, and they hightailed it out of there. In a few moments, silence filled the small clearing where they were.

“You weren’t going to kill them?” Yaomu Shou noticed something strange about Long Di’s actions.

He sighed for a moment before explaining. “I’m not a psychopath, you know.”

“Didn’t you kill that silver body cultivator from the Iron Body Forge Sect based on your thoughts on what he might do should he escape?” Yaomu Shou smirked as he asked this.

“You and I both know that ‘might’ in that case was a virtual certainty,” Long Di advised.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it,” Yaomu Shou waved it off, painfully aware of it as well.

In truth, she was impressed with Long Di’s foresight. He knew that she was troubled by something that was on her mind ever since some time ago. So the best way to get those cultivators to talk was to threaten them with death.

Of course, two out of that group died, sure, but that was their own fault. One just had to rush toward Long Di, Xiannu Liang and an injured Shen Ling. He was signing his own death warrant at that point.

The other one was the ringleader of the whole mess, so Long Di just got rid of him since his annoyance was a bit stoked at that point.

As for the others, even though Long Di was using the Crimson Horizon Flame to traumatise them, he would have brought it closer had Yaomu Shou not said anything.

It wasn’t his plan to kill them. He wasn’t some monster. He just wanted to break them mentally so they would tell Yaomu Shou whatever she wanted.

Still, it all worked out, and they spilt the beans quite easily.

“Uhm? Can I start now?” Xiannu Liang finally asked with the Ever-Dew Fruits laid around her.

Long Di and Yaomu Shou stared at her with a deadpan look before Long Di broke the silence by responding, “Yes.”

“Okay,” she nodded. She took up the fruits and headed over to the tree. Once she was under its crown and felt its vast life energy, she smiled in peace as she entered a meditative state to return to her peak state.

Both Yaomu Shou and Long Di headed over to where Jia Yan, Zi Yu, and the unconscious Shen Ling were.

Shen Ling’s face was absent of the blood that marred it before. However, the faint blood stains that pooled in the wells of her eyes were a clear sign that whatever injury she suffered was still apparent.

“That plant girl should be able to heal once she gets stronger,” Mina commented with a nod.

“Where were you the entire time? I didn’t notice you during the entire ordeal.”

Surprisingly, it was Jia Yan who asked this question. He didn’t realise until she spoke that Mina somehow escaped his realm of perception, even though he was sure she never left.

Mina smiled at his question. “Don’t beat yourself up about it. It’s something like an ability of mine.”

“Lady Yaomu Shou, is it true that there is a Spiritual Vein Root in the Bingqi Spiritual Realm?” Zi Yu asked. This had been on her mind the minute that girl spoke about what the top powers in here were all doing.

Yaomu Shou became pensive at the mention of the Spiritual Vein Root. She then looked at Long Di, saying, “We need to go!”

“Calm down,” Long Di said, raising his hands. “Now I have an idea about what that is, but I would rather you tell me since I don’t want to assume.”

Yaomu Shou took a moment to calm herself and then explained, “Do you know how spiritual stones are collected?”

This question was directed at Long Di since she assumed that the daughter of the Zi family would know of such things.

Hewn from the wealth of knowledge of countless cultivation novels, Long Di answered, “Let’s see. They are most likely mined from underground veins of spiritual ore deposits. If I’m right, this deposit can only form once a source comes to be. This source is more or less the Spiritual Vein Root that you nearly suffered a seizure for. For good measure, these Spiritual Vein Roots most likely come in different grades that allow for the creation of different grades of spiritual stones.”

Yaomu Shou stared at him, gobsmacked at his answer. Didn’t he say he didn’t know what a Spiritual Vein Root was? Then what the heck was this!?

This was an assumption!? Did the standards of assumptions change!?

“R-Right…” Yaomu Shou affirmed his answer with a nod.

She then looked at the entire group and went on. “Chances are my family is aware of this, but as I’m not regularly there, I was left out of the loop. There is a high chance that other members of my family are here. Though, I’m not sure why I haven’t been contacted yet. So we need to be careful of that.”

“What grade do you think the Spiritual Vein Root is?” Zi Yu asked.

“It’s probably a low-grade Spiritual Vein Root at best,” Yaomu Shou replied.

“I’m assuming Spiritual Vein Roots are rare?” Long Di asked.

Yaomu Shou nodded, “Very. They’re… what the heck are you doing?”

Everyone looked over to see Long Di sitting seiza style with Shen Ling’s head in his lap.

“Listening,” answered Long Di innocently.

Yaomu Shou nearly choked on her own saliva at his answer, “I mean, why is Shen Ling’s head in your lap!?”

He looked down at Shen Ling’s sleeping face in his lap and answered. “She always had my head in her lap and/or bosom when I fell unconscious, which happens way more than it should. In any case, since she did it for me, I figured I should repay the favour.”

“You can’t put a maiden’s head in your lap… it’s indecent.” said Zi Yu with a blushed expression.

“Why?” he asked.

“Because you’re a man and having her head in your lap is highly suggestive,” Yaomu Shou pointed out.

Mina sat back with a smile to watch the show. She lost count of how many times she lost to Long Di in these types of arguments.

“So when she has my head in her bosom or lap, it’s fine?”

Yaomu Shou was a bit speechless and didn’t know how to respond.

“It’s different for a woman than a man,” Zi Yu came in at the last minute to explain why it was inappropriate.

Long Di shrugged as he responded, “You’re telling me that there are laws governing what body parts can lie on another body part based on the gender alignment?”

“W-Well…” Zi Yu realised ‌she had talked herself into a corner.

“It’s wrong just because! Okay!?” Yaomu Shou couldn’t help it and just said what was on her mind.

Long Di remained unmoved by her emotional outburst and merely responded. “Just because? Your reasoning has devolved into just because? That’s the equivalent of a three-year-old’s philosophical debate on the importance of eating Legos.”

They were about to continue this losing battle when Long Di raised his hand to silence them.

“Can we please get back to the regularly scheduled programming? You,” he pointed at Yaomu Shou. “Spiritual Vein Root. Rare. Good. What else?”

Realising that they truly were deviating from the original argument, she brought it back to tell them all she knew.

According to her, Spiritual Vein Roots were not just a source of wealth for sects but a type of status as far as rankings were concerned as well.

Sects needed to be able to support from tens to upwards of millions or even billions of cultivators all at once.

Of course, this wasn’t possible without resources. As a result, sects normally fought for Spiritual Ore Deposits, as this would allow them to nurture even stronger talents.

After a while, certain sects rose above the rest, occupying a great and illustrious position compared to other normal sects. They eventually became known as the ten great sects.

Regular sects might have around several tens of low-grade Spiritual Ore Deposits. However, it was known that those who were a part of the ten great sects had several hundreds of such Spiritual Ore Deposits under their control.

It was even rumoured that the most powerful of the ten great sects, the Ice Phoenix Hall, had almost one thousand low-grade spiritual ore deposits supporting them.

Among the countless regular sects and even the great sects, not even one owned a medium-grade spiritual ore deposit.

It was not that they couldn’t find any. It was just that if such a thing was found, rivers of blood and mountains of corpses would form.

Several regular sects might even team up to go against even one of the great sects. This was how great the temptation of medium-grade spiritual ore deposits was.

After all, one medium-grade spiritual stone was equivalent to a thousand regular spiritual stones.

It was not until apex existences came down and appropriated the known medium-grade spiritual ore deposits that the wars finally ceased.

“I see.” Long Di held a finger to his chin as he thought about this.

“The Iron Body Forge Sect, in particular, will try their best to get their hands on this,” Yaomu Shou advised.

Long Di was obviously unaware of this and asked, “Why?”

“They only have ninety-nine low-grade spiritual ore deposits,” Yaomu Shou said with a laugh.

“Though they are considered one of the ten great sects, everyone else only considers them pseudo-great sect at best. This has always been a sore spot for them. They want to have a hundred at the very least, so they can properly enter the realm of ten great sects. Their strength might have the qualifications, but their wealth is still lacking,” she said proudly.

Long Di saw this and curiously asked her, “How many low-grade spiritual ore deposits do you have?”

Hearing his question, Yaomu Shou smiled mysteriously but didn’t answer.

Jia Yan finally spoke up, asking, “So when are we leaving, then?”

“I’d like to move now!” Yaomu Shou was oddly excited at the prospect of hunting the Spiritual Vein Root.

However, Long Di’s next words were like a bucket of cold water over her head.

“Let’s wait a bit,” Long Di said after a while.

“Why!?” Yaomu Shou whined like a child hearing Long Di’s decision.

“How long do we have before this Unique Realm closes?” he suddenly asked.

“About a month. Why?”

“We’ll move close to that time.”

Yaomu Shou felt her eyes widen in panic. “It’ll be snatched by then!”

Long Di was strangely calm, stating, “No, it won’t. Trust me, the climax for all of this will take place in the last few days.”

“Why are you so confident?” Yaomu Shou asked, suspicious of his confidence in such matters.

He aptly responded, “It’s a tale as old as time.”

Whoosh…

“Looks like someone is ready for their breakthroughs,” commented Long Di after feeling Xiannu Liang’s aura.

She slowly opened her emerald eyes, which shone with a soft glow. She nodded to let Long Di know she was indeed ready.

“Okay then… get to it. I’ll play the role of your dharma protector,” Long Di advised.

Xiannu Liang didn’t stand on courtesy and immediately took a bite out of the first Ever-Dew Fruit.