Chapter Eighteen: Summoning the Second General of the Crumbling Blade

  Yuanshen Baolu can be said to be a Nianfa stream, in the early stages without much combat power, mostly mixed in the secular world, known as the Taoist door of the art of divination, with corresponding techniques, can predict good and bad luck, widely establish good relationships, also known as Jianghu technicians. This is different from fortune-telling and divination in Jianghu, this is really able to foretell good and bad luck, although it cannot know the past and present life, but calculating individual events for the next few decades is still possible.

  "Practicing the Yuanshen Treasure Record requires a lot of time to meditate every day, but it's not difficult. Practicing the Yuanshen Treasure Record and summoning the Journey to the West Treasure Classic have no conflict, but rather complement each other. My divine consciousness enters the world of Journey to the West and is consumed, but through the meditation method taught by the Yuanshen Treasure Record, the consumed divine consciousness can be quickly restored, and this speed is more than twice as fast as before."

  Sun Tao practiced according to the oral instructions of the Yuanshen Treasure Record for a while, opened his tightly closed eyes, and found that this Yuanshen Treasure Record was even more practical than he had imagined. Especially the speed of recovering consumed divine thoughts was directly more than twice as fast, which allowed him to summon Little Jin twice a day, once for an hour, and Little Jin could come out twice, staying outside for two hours.

  One night, Sun Tao spent all his time cultivating the Yuanshen Treasure Record. After discovering the benefits of cultivating the Yuanshen Treasure Record, what was improved was not combat power, but divine thought. This made Sun Tao full of motivation and strong in divine thought, able to summon even more powerful little demons from the world of Journey to the West. This was even more beneficial for Sun Tao, who did not want to be a useless waste of his generation. He wanted to return to Yunlai Sect with great fanfare.

  After a night of cultivation, Sun Tuo showed no signs of fatigue, but instead was full of energy. After leaving the room, Sun Tuo ordered a table of fine wine and dishes, and after eating his fill, he returned to the room once again to meditate and cultivate his divine mind.

  Sun Tao's divine thought would enter the world of Journey to the West each time, but the speed at which his divine thought was consumed was extremely fast, and he would be expelled by the power of the world of Journey to the West every time. Every time Sun Tao's divine thought was forcibly expelled by the power of the world of Journey to the West, Sun Tao would operate the Yuanshen Treasure Record to recover his depleted divine thought. This cycle repeated itself every day, with his divine thought being depleted and then recovered through the operation of the Yuanshen Treasure Record. Except for when he got hungry and went out to order a sumptuous feast, Sun Tao spent most of his time in his own guest room.

  Thus, Sun Tao stayed at the Hongtu Inn for nearly half a month. During this time, Sun Tao remained at the Hongtu Inn, and except for eating, drinking, and relieving himself, he was cultivating every moment. In this period, his spiritual sense made significant progress, although it was still far from materializing his yuan Shen. His summoning of the Western Journey Treasure also made some progress. During this half-month period, the world of Journey to the West underwent earth-shaking changes. The monkeys of Mount Huaguo grew in strength under the leadership of Sun Wukong, who had gone on a journey across the seas to seek enlightenment. The vast Mount Huaguo was left with only a group of mischievous monkeys frolicking and playing in the mountains.

  "The summoning power I've cultivated is much stronger than before, and I can now summon two monkeys at once. The time limit has also increased from one hour to two hours. Unfortunately, the summoned monkeys are all mediocre in strength, only excelling in speed and agility, with low combat effectiveness, equivalent to a second-rate martial artist in the mortal world."

  "The boundary of minor success in summoning the small demon from the 'Tome of Summoning' is not far away. Let me try to summon it once today and see if I can summon that second-in-command, Pang." After lunch, Sun Tao returned to his residence, thinking about the results of his cultivation over the past half month. Sun Wukong was not in Mount Huaguo, but the four generals were. Sun Tao had tried to summon these four generals before, but each time ended in failure. This time, he felt that he had made some progress in summoning the 'Journey to the West' treasure, and now he wanted to try again, muttering to himself.

  The world of Journey to the West is constantly evolving every day, and its development speed has a direct impact on Sun Wukong's divine consciousness. The stronger Sun Wukong's divine consciousness is, the faster the evolution of the world of Journey to the West will be, and the more vast the world that Sun Wukong sees in it will be. So far, Sun Wukong can only see the limited area of Huaguo Mountain and the East China Sea, and he feels a bit powerless when looking at distant places.

  Due to the limitations of his spiritual cultivation, at a certain level of cultivation, the creatures that Sun Tao can summon are actually not much different in strength, similar to the 72 Cave Demon Kings of Mount Huaguo. Sun Tao is also unable to summon one. Even if he catches a glimpse of its shadow, it's extremely difficult for him to summon it out.

  Practicing the summoning of the Western Journey Treasure, Sun Tao not only summoned out Little Monkey and Little Golden, but also other little monkeys. As soon as these little monkeys appeared in the house, Sun Tao was convinced of his own judgment, and then he sent them into the world of Journey to the West again. Every day, he would practice dozens of times, and as long as he recited the true words, with a light shout of "zhao!", he could immediately summon out the living beings in the divine thought circle.

  Sun Tao recited the true words, and a "zhāo" character spouted out of his mouth. Sun Tao's divine thought transformed into a light circle, which entered the world of Journey to the West, where Bajie, one of the two marshals, was playing with a group of monkeys, suddenly found himself in an unfamiliar room.

  Beasts have their own language, birds have their own language. When they reached the realm of Bōngbā, the two generals were able to communicate with them spiritually. This spiritual communication allowed them to understand human speech. As soon as Bōng saw Sun Wukong, he suddenly rushed up and asked: "Who are you? Why did I appear here?"

  "I am your master now, and you will obey my commands. I have summoned you from the world of Journey to the West." Sun Tao saw that this monster could actually speak human language, which was beyond his understanding, and he suppressed the doubts in his heart, suddenly shouting at the monster.

  "Master, so you're my master after all! No wonder I had a very familiar feeling about you." The gibbon on his back scratched his head in some confusion and then said.

  Can summon the Monkey King, one of the two Monkey Kings in Journey to the West, Sun Wukong's summoning Western Treasure Classic has entered the realm of small success, can truly summon various little monsters in Journey to the West.

  After learning about the information of the collapsed general, Sun Tao is an incantation to activate the mouth, and then recite the true words, which will be received in the world of Journey to the West. Turning the Yuanshen Treasure Record for a week, the consumed divine thought will be restored. Sun Tao was thinking of the Eastern True Words, and the divine thought locked onto the collapsed general in the world of Journey to the West, while this general was also a gibbon monkey. After getting along well with these two generals, when they are needed, they can be summoned directly and thrown into battle.

  The four strongmen will be Monkey King's reliable assistants, it is because of these four strongmen managing the monkeys in the Mountain of Flowers and Fruits that Monkey King can go to seek the immortal Taoist skills with peace of mind. On top of these four strongmen, there are also the two marshals Ma Liu Er Yuan Shuai, these two red-buttocked horse monkeys cannot be summoned by Sun Wukong at present. Summoning the four strongmen is already a great effort, as for Ma Liu Er Yuan Shuai, Sun Wukong's divine thought still needs to be strengthened, at least to reach the true small accomplishment of summoning small monsters realm. He has just grasped the realm of summoning small monsters.

  "A ordinary little monkey can deal with the second-rate martial artists in this mundane world, relying on the agility of the monkey. It's not impossible to fight against the top martial artists in this world either. Even against a cultivator in the Qi Refining stage, I can exchange several rounds without using any magical tools or talismans. Now that I have these two generals, I also have some self-defense capabilities in this world!" As he sent those two generals into the world of Journey to the West, Sun Wukong opened the window and gazed out at the blue sky and white clouds, lost in thought.

  Now, Sun Tuo's task is to cultivate diligently in the River Water County and wait until his Yuanshen Treasure Record is slightly successful, allowing him to transform his divine consciousness into a sword. At that time, he can return to Yunlan Sect. He wants to clear the name of waste, he wants to prove to the world that he, Sun Tuo, is not a waste.

  Pulling his thoughts back to reality, Sun Tao was able to summon the second-in-command of the Flower Fruit Mountain from the Journey to the West, and he was in high spirits. This was not far from washing away his reputation as a waste. If he could summon the accomplished Monkey King, then he would be able to return to the Yunlai Sect and make those disciples who had bullied him when he was down on his luck take a good look.

  Sun Tuo rubbed his belly and felt hungry. It was time for lunch. He closed the door and headed downstairs.

  A sumptuous feast was ordered, and Sun Tao leaned against the window, listening to the music, dozing off with his eyes closed, tapping his legs to the rhythm. From time to time, he would shout "Good!" and toss a large piece of silver onto the stage where the young singer was performing with increasing vigor. The days passed leisurely, extremely carefree.

  Heshui County, a bustling and prosperous county town with a population of nearly one million, is filled with people coming and going. The noise is deafening, and the various vendors' calls are music to the ears. Sun Tuo was seeing Heshui County for the first time in his life, and he was struck by its unique charm - the green glazed tiles, the blue-gray stone slabs paving the streets, this ancient county town really had a flavor all its own.