Chapter 36: Dòng Fǔ

  Having figured out the reason for walking on fire, Lin Feng vaguely understood what to pay attention to in his mental training, which is not to be too obsessed, strive with effort, success is best, failure doesn't need to be overly concerned, just enjoy the process of striving.

  With this realization, Lin Feng's mind immediately became calm as water, and he was no longer affected by the negative emotions from earlier. At this point, Lin Feng had truly emerged from his state of agitation, and his heart had also become much more open-minded.

  I've arrived in the Cultivation Realm! Lin Feng shouted loudly in his heart, opening up his chest and walking exceptionally lightly along the mountain road to the west. There was his destination for this trip - Yao Guang City. This was marked on the map given by the master of the house before he left, about 500 miles west of Qing Yang Gate, the nearest large market where cultivators gathered.

  Five hundred miles, it's not far to say, nor is it close. If a cultivator of the foundation period or above were to fly with their sword, they would arrive in the time it takes to drink a cup of tea. But for someone like Lin Feng, who is only at the Qi Refining stage, even if he uses his divine movement technique, it would still take him three or four days to walk that distance. Of course, as a cultivator, even if they can't fly like those in the foundation period, they can use special talismans like the Divine Movement Symbol to increase their walking speed and cover long distances quickly. With this method, five hundred miles would only take half a day to cover.

  Lin Feng didn't have a divine movement symbol, but he wasn't in a hurry to rush on the road either. Early on his way to Qingyang Gate, Lin Feng had used the jade pendant to check out the situation around Qingyang Gate. The heavenly materials and earthly treasures here were far more numerous than those at Cuishi Mountain. Such a good opportunity couldn't be missed, so he naturally wanted to collect them extensively. Therefore, Lin Feng infused a thread of spiritual power into the jade pendant in his dantian as soon as he walked out of the mountain gate of Qingyang Gate, paying attention to both the direction and the changes on the jade pendant.

  As for Bao Yu, what's worth being excited about is that since entering the fourth layer of the Refining Qi period, Lin Feng felt that as long as he infused spiritual energy into the treasure, the colorful halo on top of it became much clearer than before. The detection distance also increased by about ten zhang, which means that now Lin Feng can detect all the spiritual objects within a width of nearly two hundred zhang along his route, and none of them can escape Bao Yu's detection.

  This made Lin Feng extremely happy, it meant that he had not yet brought out the maximum effect of the Jade due to his own power, and as long as he continued to improve, the Jade would also play a greater role.

  "Hmm? Red, should be a second-order one." Lin Feng walked less than a mile before discovering a red dot appearing on the treasure map. Judging by the heat emitted from the red dot, Lin Feng was certain it was a second-order spiritual object, but whether it was a spiritual ore or a spiritual medicine remained unknown.

  He walked quickly, and soon a fiery red spirit grass appeared before his eyes. Flame Grass, a second-grade spirit grass, had an effect similar to that of Spirit Dew Grass, and was often used in many second-grade pill formulas as a kind of spirit medicine. Its value wasn't very high among second-grade spirit medicines, but Lin Feng didn't mind this; as long as he had a harvest, he was happy. Moreover, having picked a second-grade spirit grass right from the start made Lin Feng even more confident in this vast mountain range. He drew out his steel sword and dug up the Flame Grass roots and all, putting it into his storage bag. With a heart full of joy, Lin Feng continued to walk forward.

  It must be said that the spiritual energy of the Qianlian Mountains is indeed abundant, and the spiritual medicine it nurtures is far more abundant than that of Cuishi Mountain. In Cuishi Mountain, Lin Feng had to use his precious jade to search for herbs, and he would have to walk three to five miles before discovering one, which was mostly first-grade. But here, he could find spiritual medicine after walking about a mile or so, and the proportion of first- and second-grade spiritual grasses was almost equal.

  Lin Feng was overjoyed as he picked more and more, at first he would occasionally correct his route so as not to stray too far from the main path. However, soon he forgot his original intention of picking some spiritual herbs along the way in one surprise after another. As a result, when he put away another second-grade spiritual grass into his storage bag, he was extremely depressed to find that he had gotten lost.

  He looked around, but all he saw were mountains, each with a different shape. Lin Feng couldn't recognize any of them, and after a long time trying to identify his location, he was still completely lost. He knew it was impossible to return to the main road now. Fortunately, the sunlight above him could at least indicate the general direction. Lin Feng thought for a moment, and since there was no other way, he decided to follow the direction of the sun, heading west. This should bring him closer to the city of Rouyu, where he might encounter some cultivators who could ask for directions.

  With a mind made up, Lin Feng freely traversed the dense forest of the deep mountains. In any case, heading west was going out of the Xi Lian mountain range, and he wasn't afraid of running into demonic beasts or the like. As for ordinary wild beasts, not to mention that he still had the mid-grade artifact-level Fish Dragon Sword in his hand, even if he were empty-handed, ordinary wild beasts wouldn't dare pose any threat to him.

  So Lin Feng continued on his journey through the deep mountains, picking herbs and hurrying along, practicing when he was tired, eating wild fruits or catching small animals when he was hungry, and roughly getting by with the dry rations he had brought, living a carefree life, feeling somewhat like a bird soaring in the vast sky.

  Two days passed, and Lin Feng's journey, which was initially focused on hurrying along with the occasional collection of herbs, gradually shifted to focus on collecting herbs with the occasional hurry. As a result, his progress slowed down indefinitely. However, this couldn't be blamed on Lin Feng - there were simply too many spiritual herbs in the area. He would pick one and take only a few steps before discovering another, causing him to change direction once again. His route transformed from a straight line to a zigzag pattern, making it impossible for him not to slow down.

  Although the progress was a bit slow, the harvest was rich. The storage bag was piled up with all kinds of spiritual medicine like a small mountain, and it's estimated that its value had already exceeded a thousand pieces of spirit stone, making Lin Feng involuntarily smile foolishly every time he saw it.

  Five days had passed, and Lin Feng finally decided to give up his strategy of picking herbs while rushing on the road. It wasn't that he didn't want to pick anymore, but rather that he had already picked a sufficient amount of spiritual herbs. Most importantly, these spiritual herbs required processing; otherwise, their spiritual energy would leak out, and their efficacy would greatly decrease, making it all for naught.

  Early that morning, Lin Feng habitually infused his spiritual energy into the jade and walked for a while before remembering his determination to hurry along the road with all his might from the previous day. Just as he was about to withdraw his spiritual energy and focus on hurrying along, the heat emanating from the jade suddenly surged greatly. Upon closer inspection, another red dot had appeared on the jade. Judging by its temperature, Lin Feng immediately determined that this heat was far beyond what a second-grade spiritual object could emit. He hesitated for a moment before proceeding in the direction indicated by the red dot.

  Lin Feng quickly arrived at the location of the red dot, carefully observing for half a day, but did not find any spiritual medicine or spiritual ore. After going back and forth several times, Lin Feng was certain that the position was correct, and he was standing right on the spot indicated by the treasure map, but except for a patch of green grass, nothing else was found.

  Could it be that these grasses are spiritual medicines? Lin Feng didn't dare guarantee that he could recognize all spiritual medicines, but these grasses were indeed no different from the other grasses around. Looking up at the sky again, there was a blank space above his head, nothing was there, and it was impossible for there to be any treasures. Could they be underground?

  Lin Feng thought it was possible, so he carefully dug up the green grass with his sword, revealing the loose soil underneath. After seeing that there was nothing unusual, he continued to dig down, about one meter deep, but found nothing. Lin Feng was a bit shaken and walked away for a distance before looking again. The red dot on the treasure map was still there, exactly where he had dug the hole.

  It's strange, it was clearly here, how can't I find it? Lin Feng muttered to himself, if it wasn't for the fact that collecting medicine had been going so smoothly all this time, he would have suspected that something was wrong with the treasure. But if the spiritual object is indeed under here, the only reason it can't be dug up is because it's buried too deep.

  If that's the case, then it means that the detection function of the treasure is not in a planar mode, but rather in a three-dimensional mode. Lin Feng had never thought about whether the treasure could detect things in the sky or underground before, and now with this discovery, he suddenly remembered when he was standing on Yang Ze's flying sword to detect the spiritual objects on the ground, he should have known that the detection range of the treasure is three-dimensional, but at that time he was too excited, so he didn't pay much attention.

  I understand now, Lin Feng came again with energy and continued digging along the hole he dug earlier. "Ding!" The steel sword seemed to have hit a stone and was bounced back, almost stabbing Lin Feng. Lin Feng withdrew his steel sword, removed the loose soil, and immediately discovered that it wasn't a stone, but rather a flowing light in the soil. When he touched it with his hand, he could feel a soft and elastic force bouncing his hand back.

  It was actually a spell formation! Lin Feng immediately understood that he might have found a treasure. In such a desolate mountain and forest, there is such a spell formation, which is generally opened by other cultivators as a cave or used to seal treasures. Whatever it is, there are usually good things inside, and this can also be seen clearly from the jade.

  After some thought, Lin Feng was certain that the things inside were ownerless because if it were a restricted treasure formation, it would generally have a short duration and be guarded by someone. The fact that there was no one around suggested that it shouldn't be. The possibility of it being a cave mansion was much greater, but Lin Feng had been digging for so long and had touched the formation, yet there was no movement or noise inside, which meant that there was probably no one inside.

  With this judgment, Lin Feng decided to explore the cave. After carefully observing the surrounding environment, Lin Feng soon discovered that he was actually standing on a small hill, because the direction of his arrival was relatively flat, so he didn't notice it, and now he realized that this small hill was not small at all.

  Lin Feng thought for a moment that ordinary people usually open mountain caves from the side, and it's rare to drill directly down from the surface. So he walked around to the back of the mountain and started observing carefully.

  Want to break the array, starting from the cave entrance is the simplest. However, after taking a look at the situation of Xiaoshan Bao, there are no obvious signs of array patterns, indicating that the entrance also has a fantasy array or something similar. Judging from Lin Feng's limited knowledge of simple array patterns learned from his Shu Shu, it doesn't seem like an easy task to find the cave entrance on Xiaoshan Bao, which looks almost identical to its surroundings.

  However, Lin Feng was a simple-minded person with simple methods. If he couldn't see it, he would use his sense of touch. Ordinary illusions might be able to deceive people's eyes, but they found it difficult to deceive their sense of touch. A tree, a blade of grass, a protruding rock, or even an inch of grass skin - Lin Feng carefully checked everything. Although it was slow, thinking about that red dot which was even more intense than the second-grade spiritual object, Lin Feng was full of energy.