One day later, the sun was setting.
With a crisp sound, Yang Yunhai landed on his toes on the dry grass-covered ground, arriving at the edge of the Star Dou Great Forest.
In the fading light, he looked up to see towering, twenty-meter-tall ancient trees everywhere. All sorts of ferns, mosses, and fungi densely crawled along the trunks, and the ground was overgrown with shrubs.
The wind rustled through the branches and leaves, producing a continuous rustling sound, mixed with the chirping of unknown insects.
Looking deeper into the forest, the vegetation became even denser, the sunlight was completely blocked out, leaving only a deep, abyss-like darkness. With all the subtle noises coming from the surroundings, the atmosphere felt rather unsettling.
"No wonder it's called the Star Dou Great Forest..." Yang Yunhai sighed. In his previous life, he'd never even heard of such a lush and ancient forest. The Amazon was nothing in comparison.
"Better play it safe. I'll rest here for the night," he thought as he walked toward a grassy area nearby.
He took a bottle of bug repellent powder from his bag and sprinkled it around, then pulled out what little dry food he had left and started eating.
"Man, it's really inconvenient without a storage soul tool." After a few bites, Yang Yunhai couldn't help but complain.
For safety, he had brought several bottles of commercially available bug repellent, but limited by his bag's capacity, he couldn't bring much else. He only had one set of spare clothes and not much food.
Once the food ran out, he'd have no choice but to forage.
"When I get to Heaven Dou City, I've got to find a way to get a storage soul tool from the Spirit Hall!"
"If it can store living things, even better."
He chuckled at his own optimism. After finishing the dry food, he took a few sips of water from his bamboo tube and began meditating to cultivate.
The reason he chose this spot was because, from the sky, he had seen that the ground here was covered in Blue Silver Grass, an ideal natural environment for camouflage cultivation. The surroundings were also relatively open, so if a soul beast approached, he'd be able to detect it in time.
Time passed slowly.
"Hm?" As time went on, Yang Yunhai suddenly realized that the speed at which his soul power circulated had noticeably increased. He hadn't intentionally changed anything,he simply followed the natural flow of his soul power, and it moved smoothly and effortlessly.
Earlier, to avoid any surprises like Tang Hao showing up, he had quickly left the mountain range without much rest, so he hadn't noticed.
"Could it be that my eight extraordinary meridians have really been unblocked? And it even comes with this kind of benefit?" Yang Yunhai was slightly shocked.
Natural is best. He didn't believe that this body's self-regulated soul power flow was any worse than the altered routes in the Xuan Tian Technique. What's the point of trying to rewire your own blood vessels?
The body isn't clay, you can't just mold it however you want.
The key point was that his eight extraordinary meridians had been unblocked!
At least, that's what he believed. He didn't really understand much about meridians or cultivation methods, he just thought that forcibly altering your internal circulation system might not be such a good idea.
"Whatever! My cultivation is faster, my body's fine, so I'll take it!"
"Besides, this feeling..." He paused his cultivation, focused his mind, and was amazed by what he sensed.
"Could it be..." He suddenly recalled a scene from the original story, where Tang San, thanks to his Blue Silver Emperor bloodline, resonated with the surrounding Blue Silver Grass and gained the ability to gather information through it.
Thinking of this, Yang Yunhai immediately summoned his martial soul, then cleared his mind and focused on sensing the Blue Silver Grass around him.
Before long, he distinctly felt friendly, cheerful, and pleasant emotions. These were unique feelings and a special aura coming directly from the surrounding Blue Silver Grass.
Strange, special energy constantly passed through the blades and leaves of the Blue Silver Grass into his body, then slowly flowed back out.
Soon, a mental image formed in his mind and spread outward with the flow of energy. The image expanded further and further, eventually covering a radius of several hundred meters. He felt as though he was in a vast blue ocean and could clearly see the outlines of objects in the area.
With greater focus, he could even make out fine details.
It was as if the Blue Silver Grass within the area had become his eyes, nose, and ears, sharing everything it saw and felt with him.
"This is unbelievable!" Yang Yunhai was stunned.
"Spiritual power!" he realized. It was the first time he truly felt the existence of this energy.
"So, when I absorbed my first spirit ring and was able to see my meridians and the flow of soul power, the real reason was probably my spiritual power,the strength of it had reached the threshold!" Yang Yunhai reflected.
Absorbing spirit rings could increase spiritual power, something the original story clearly mentioned. Also, the times he brought lightning into his body had undoubtedly inflicted great pain on him, which in turn had tempered his spirit.
So his spiritual power had improved.
The combination of absorbing spirit rings and being tempered by lightning had pushed his spiritual power to a level where he could perceive his own meridians.
And during the recent trip through the mountains, those continuous lightning sessions had taken his spiritual strength even further.
Thus, he was now able to perceive the information transmitted by the Blue Silver Grass. Of course, the biggest reason was the evolution of his bloodline, which made the grass willing to share its information.
"Who needs the Purple Demon Eye? I've got lightning to enhance my spiritual power," Yang Yunhai said happily.
"Also, with this information-gathering and environmental-sensing ability, entering the Star Dou Great Forest will be much safer and make it easier to find the right soul beasts. This is exactly what I needed!"
Without hesitation, he calmed himself and focused on getting used to the ability.
The more familiar and skilled he became at using this power, the easier his path ahead would be.
He couldn't miss this opportunity.
Time passed, and soon it was deep into the night.
"Rustle... rustle..." Within the shared vision of the Blue Silver Grass, a snake-like soul beast about as thick as a wrist and clearly over a hundred years old was slithering closer.
"Perfect, a little snack for tonight!" Once it got close enough, Yang Yunhai suddenly opened his eyes, flicked his right hand, and his martial soul extended into a vine that whipped straight at the snake.
Ten seconds later, the snake was limp and paralyzed.
Yang Yunhai stood up, built a decent fire, and then took out a dagger to clean, skin, and debone the snake like a professional.
Since this was the forest's outermost edge, he wasn't too worried about the fire attracting dangerous soul beasts.
After that, he had a delicious and satisfying meal.
Full and content, he resumed cultivating.
The next day, just before dawn, Yang Yunhai woke early, had a simple bite to eat, and headed deeper into the Star Dou Great Forest.
Blue Silver Grass could be found in every forest, and the Star Dou Great Forest was no exception.
Because of his enhanced perception through the shared vision with the Blue Silver Grass and his flying ability provided by the Blue Silver Emperor's right leg bone, the journey so far had been relatively safe.
Two days later, although he couldn't be sure if he'd officially entered the thousand-year soul beast region, the increasing number of thousand-year soul beasts made it very likely.
Yang Yunhai became more cautious as he advanced.
Until two days later, within the Blue Silver Grass's shared vision, Yang Yunhai clearly saw the outline of what looked like a three-meter-tall stone hill. But on closer inspection, it was clearly not just a rock.
It looked more like a long snake coiled atop a boulder, covering the entire surface so that the outline appeared smooth and rounded.
Looking even closer, the rounded contours were covered with diamond-shaped stone-like growths, almost like barnacles attached to the snake's body.
It looked very strange.
"Looks like a coiled snake, body covered in stone barnacles? Wait, wait!" Yang Yunhai's heart skipped a beat. He immediately opened his eyes, activated his flying soul bone, and quickly approached.
Soon, he arrived about thirty meters away.
"Just not sure whether it's alive, or if it's already been hollowed out by ants to use as a nest. Judging by its size, it's at least three thousand years old."
"The age is right, and its traits are even better suited for my third soul ring than the Ghost Vine."
Honestly, he had originally planned to seek out a Ghost Vine for its parasitic soul skill.
A parasitic ability for tracking, combined with his second skill that allows autonomous soul power absorption to sustain it,great for long-range detection. Then, for close combat, he could lock onto a target, strike with lightning. Inject unstable lightning energy into the parasitic seed,throw a grenade, step on a landmine. Or even absorb it into the body, let it feed on soul power, then detonate it from within!
Tang San, you don't know jack about playing with parasites!
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