Sage of Humanity
Chapter 1047 - 1045: Accumulation

After helping Tofu Lady sell tofu for three days, Lu Ye returned to the Sacred Mountain.

Pushing open his own door, the room was filled with blood crystals of varying sizes and qualities, evidently sent by the senior brother's orders.

Blood crystals come from the Blood Race. In this recent war, the human race didn't collect many blood crystals because almost all of the invading Blood Race were slain outside the defense line, their bodies falling into the Empyrean Sea, making it impossible to collect any blood crystals.

These blood crystals were collected from previous battles and stored, in significant quantities.

Lu Ye smiled knowingly and went into the room, sitting cross-legged.

He activated the power of the Talent Tree, and invisible roots spread out, plunging into the nearby blood crystals, devouring them to their heart's content, transforming them into his own foundation.

The cultivation in the True Lake Realm is for cultivators to refine their own spirit force. Every advancement in a level involves a transformation of spirit force, and the True Lake Level 9 involves nine transformations of spirit force.

Theoretically, the disparity between each minor level in the True Lake Realm causes the spirit force quality and quantity to differ by a factor of two. However, in reality, the difference is not that vast.

Nonetheless, each level's advancement in the True Lake Realm significantly boosts a cultivator's strength.

This is why as cultivators progress in their cultivation, it's increasingly difficult to defeat enemies across levels. Those talented elites who could fight across levels in the Spirit Stream Realm and Cloud River Realm may not have such an ability in the True Lake Realm.

Lu Ye is an exception.

In the True Lake Level 1, he developed Mental Consciousness, which, when supplemented by Mental Consciousness, often allowed him to defeat enemies across several levels. Back when he was at True Lake Level 3, he killed Tan Shu, who was several levels above him, at the Dark Moon Forest Pass, causing a major stir. The name of Li Taibai resounded throughout Dark Moon Forest Pass overnight, even being once recognized by the small pass chief, Lin Yue, as someone who could rival Lu Yiye of the Righteous Blood Sect.

Unfortunately, heaven is jealous of geniuses, and the rising star soon encountered calamity, leaving Lin Yue lamenting.

Of course, even without Mental Consciousness, Lu Ye could defeat enemies across levels mainly because his spirit force was extremely pure.

From the start of his cultivation journey, he had the Talent Tree by his side, and it can be said that his spirit force was entirely free of impurities, something unmatched by any other cultivator.

Cultivators inevitably need to take elixirs in their cultivation. Even if a cultivator has unique means to dissolve pill poison, it's nothing compared to the Talent Tree's relentless burning.

The purer foundation of spirit force compared to Lu Ye would gradually widen after the first, second, third... up to the ninth transformation.

In the same cultivation realm, Lu Ye could always exert more power.

Now, he is already at True Lake Level 9, with his spirit force at the pinnacle of purity; what he can do now is increase his spirit force reserve and enhance the foundation of his physical body.

According to what senior brother said, it's about accumulating the physical body's power to a degree that the mind cannot control, thus creating a subconscious need for change, which is the opportunity to advance to the Divine Sea Realm.

Using the Talent Tree for cultivation doesn't require much effort—simply maintaining it is sufficient. Of course, this process also consumes mental power.

For him now, it's a good thing because, as the senior brother mentioned, while enhancing the body's foundation, one also needs to refine one's mental power. Progressing together this way will achieve the best results.

Lu Ye complied.

He split some of his Mental Consciousness, continuously activating the power of the Talent Tree, and then used his Mental Consciousness to construct Soul Taming Divine Runes.

This is his advantage.

Other cultivators at this stage need to rely on various Visualization Techniques to consume their mental power, which is cumbersome and inefficient.

But he doesn't need any Visualization Technique; he only needs to construct divine runes to continually consume his Mental Consciousness.

Of course, this construction is done out of thin air, without an object to apply to, nor expecting to control anyone.

But soon, Lu Ye discovered a problem.

If he continued like this, wouldn't his mental power only get stronger? As mental power strengthens, so does Mental Consciousness, and it becomes even easier to control the physical body's power. Even though he's continuously enhancing the body's foundation, when would the physical body meet the standard to provoke his subconscious demand for change?

Stopping his actions, Lu Ye quietly pondered.

Such cultivation, although both the body and Mental Consciousness are growing, the physical body's growth rate will definitely far exceed Mental Consciousness. After all, from True Lake Level 1 to now, his Divine Pool hasn't changed much, and the strengthening of Mental Consciousness has relied entirely on consuming Soul Cleansing Water, indicating that enhancing Mental Consciousness is still quite difficult.

The recent slight expansion of the Divine Pool is likely the result of long-term accumulation.

So this cultivation method is fine; as long as his physical body's foundation enhances rapidly enough, the opportunity will eventually come.

In fact, because he already possesses Mental Consciousness, he can accumulate a more significant foundation at this True Lake Realm level.

Other True Lake cultivators don't have such an advantage.

If other True Lake cultivators need to accumulate the physical body's foundation to a certain level at this stage to have the chance to advance to the Divine Sea Realm, then the foundation Lu Ye needs to accumulate is several times, even ten times, or more than that of a typical True Lake cultivator.

If it's like constructing a house, where others have only one thin layer of foundation in the Divine Sea Realm, he has several layers...

In this way, when he truly advances to the Divine Sea Realm, the strength he can unleash will naturally be more robust than a typical Divine Sea Realm cultivator.

Of course, Lu Ye could anticipate that due to his special circumstances, the difficulty of this promotion to the Divine Sea was unmatched by most.

He had already prepared himself mentally.

A year was enough time!

Probably...

One Soul Taming Divine Rune after another was constantly constructed. When he started to feel a bit tired, Lu Ye would stop to rest, sit quietly, and meditate to slowly restore his mental power.

This process was directly visible.

The manifestation was seen at the Divine Pool. The pool was not empty but contained some water, which was the manifestation of his Mental Consciousness.

With excessive Mental Consciousness depletion, the pool water would decrease; when his Mental Consciousness was full, the pool would also be full.

Restoring Mental Consciousness was very cumbersome, as there was no elixir pill or miracle cure for it. Especially for someone like Lu Ye, whose Mental Consciousness wasn't strong, he used to simply use Soul Cleansing Water to recover with ease and speed, but now that's not possible.

The eldest brother had stated that at this critical juncture, any action akin to forcing growth was inadvisable.

So Lu Ye could only let his Mental Consciousness recover on its own slowly.

And so the cycle continued. freew\ebno\vel..(c)om

In the room, Lu Ye sat cross-legged, continuously activating the power of the Talent Tree. Blood Crystals turned into powder; when the Divine Pool was full, he'd construct Soul Taming Divine Runes; when it was depleted, he'd rest and wait with peace of mind.

He wasn't in complete seclusion all the time, as he didn't have the nature for it.

After all, he was still young and energetic, unlike those elders who had cultivated for hundreds of years and could sit still.

Every once in a while, he would go down the mountain for a walk, go to Tofu Lady to eat some tofu pudding, get his fortune told by an old fortune teller, play a few games of chess with an elder, or even plant rice seedlings with Mong Jie in the fields...

It's hard to imagine the third generation Sect Leader of the Righteousness Sect wearing a straw hat, trousers rolled up, busy in the muddy fields.

However, Lu Ye slowly got used to the temperaments of these elders, who had reached the Transformation Realm in cultivation and didn't need to cultivate, always finding something to pass the time.

It isn't accurate to say that immersing themselves in worldly pleasures is what they love most to do.

Of course, not all of the elders were like this; some maintained the demeanor of reclusive sages, living in seclusion in remote and desolate places.

He didn't intentionally seek these elders out, mainly because there were dozens of them scattered around the Sacred Island, and he could always encounter one or two while wandering.

Considering his identity as the Sacred Master's junior brother, and his significant contribution in fighting against the Blood Race army in the previous great battle, the elders naturally viewed him differently and were more than happy to interact with him.

No one was teaching him cultivation techniques since, with their keen insight, the elders could see that he was currently at a critical point in breaking through to the Divine Sea Realm. It was not advisable to give too much guidance at this stage because the more they taught, the more confusion would arise, and they knew the Sacred Master must have already provided instructions on this matter.

The Sacred Master might not be as old as them, but in terms of cultivation, age doesn't matter. Since the Sacred Master had given orders, why should they overstep their bounds?

Lu Ye also wouldn't proactively seek their advice. He now had his own goals and just needed to progress steadily towards them.

Having no utilitarian interactions was the most comforting.

If it were in the Nine Provinces, every one of these elders would be well-known throughout the region, and if they appeared, they would undoubtedly be surrounded by disciples and followers, leaving no time for leisure like this.

After more than half a year, Lu Ye had interacted with almost all the elders.

He was unclear about which ones were from the Haotian Alliance or the Ten Thousand Demons Ridge, and didn't even know the names of many of them.

He only knew a limited few by name.

In a place like this, it was entirely unnecessary to distinguish between the Haotian Alliance and the Ten Thousand Demons Ridge.

However, in private interactions, the elders would still point out each other's shortcomings. One would say someone wasn't a good person and advised Lu Ye to watch out, while another would say someone was vicious and told Lu Ye to avoid them.

It seemed that speaking ill of those they looked down upon in front of Lu Ye was their greatest amusement. They never had this opportunity before, but now they did.

Every time it happened, Lu Ye would nod repeatedly in agreement, appearing as an eager-to-learn youth, making the elders feel Lu Ye was a talent worth cultivating.

Recently, however, Lu Ye noticed that the number of elders on the Sacred Island had somehow decreased, and often he couldn't find the elders at their usual spots, not even his eldest brother.

Beside the tofu stall of Tofu Lady, Lu Ye squatted with Dao Thirteen, each holding a large bowl, eating smooth tofu pudding while asking, "Senior, where has my eldest brother gone?"

Lady Moon, while attending to customers, responded without turning her head, "He's gone to look for Blood Crystals for you."

"Hmm?" Lu Ye was dumbfounded.

"The Sacred Master said your cultivation consumes a lot, and the currently stored Blood Crystals might not meet your needs, so he took a group out to sea to scavenge for Blood Crystals." She didn't hide it, mainly because there was no need to.