Chapter 403 - 35: Extraterritorial Bodhisattva
With the speed of his Escape Light, Fang Cheng could bring the brothers Jingyuan and Jingxuan to any location in the Eastern Wilderness in less than a day.
As there was still over a month until the start of the auction at the Celestial Traveling Immortal Pavilion, he took his two sons traveling through the wilderness.
After stabilizing his Cultivation, he no longer needed to consciously sit in meditation to refine the Spiritual Power within the Resentment Demon Bead. He could now cultivate while walking, sitting, or lying down, and his Magical Power increased with each passing day.
His teachings for his two sons were somewhat unrefined. The vast, untamed wilderness contained all sorts of natural treasures, Fierce Beasts, and demons.
From identifying treasures and Spiritual Medicines to hunting Fierce Beasts and learning to navigate by the stars and the terrain, it took less than a few days for Jingyuan and Jingxuan to feel utterly exhausted.
This was especially true when their father threw them directly in front of a Tier Two Demon Ape. The two fought with all their might, relying on the Protective Treasures bestowed by their mothers to narrowly slay the beast against all odds.
That battle was enough to leave an impression that would last a lifetime.
Another time, Fang Cheng threw the two brothers into a pack of Tier One Demon Wolves and then vanished.
The two brothers managed to break out of the pack with great difficulty. Unable to find their father anywhere, they could only pick a random direction and flee frantically.
The pack of Demon Wolves hounded them for five days and five nights before the brothers finally managed to kill them all, bringing the ordeal to a close.
To go from being pampered young masters with no worldly concerns to being dropped into the wild and dangerous Wilderness—even knowing their father was intentionally testing them, such heart-pounding encounters were enough to awaken the two youths’ potential.
After their chase with the Demon Wolves was over, Fang Cheng reappeared.
This time, he suppressed his Cultivation to the Seventh Layer of Sensing to spar with the brothers, constantly pointing out flaws in their techniques during the heat of battle.
To his great satisfaction, both sons had more than enough potential. Under his tutelage, the elder, Fang Jingyuan, had a sudden epiphany during a spar and comprehended the Divine Technique, Sword Heart Clarity, causing his Swordsmanship to improve by leaps and bounds.
The younger, Fang Jingxuan, was skilled in the Dao of Arrays and Talismans. While his methods were complex and varied, he lacked a powerful Divine Technique. In the end, Fang Cheng passed down the Celestial Fire Body Forging Technique to him and personally guided his practice, giving him a proper Slaughter Technique.
From then on, the brothers could easily hunt Tier One Fierce Beasts in the wilderness.
When they encountered weaker Tier Two Fierce Beasts, they could reliably slay them by working together.
Compared to ordinary Late-stage Sensing Cultivators, the brothers had a much deeper foundation. Having consumed Dragon Tooth Rice and various Spiritual Elixirs and Wondrous Medicines since they were young, their physiques and Qi Seas far surpassed those of their peers.
Coupled with their Tier Two Flying Swords and Tier Two Talismans, dealing with Tier Two Fierce Beasts should have been easy for them. The only thing they lacked was combat experience.
Now, Fang Cheng was shoring up that weakness.
Fang Cheng himself was not idle. While overseeing his sons’ growth, he also scoured the lands for Spiritual Medicines and hunted Fierce Beasts.
Unfortunately, Tier Four Fierce Beasts were quite rare in the Wilderness Domain, and Tier Three Demon Beasts were of little value to him. He collected their remains to be disposed of later at the Celestial Traveling Immortal Pavilion or the Void Ghost Marketplace.
「That night.」
The sky was full of stars, and the cool radiance of the moon washed over the vast lands of the Wilderness.
Atop a towering mountain, Fang Cheng had started a bonfire. He roasted a Tier Two Fierce Beast as he and his two sons camped under the open sky.
After these days of harsh training, Jingyuan and Jingxuan had clearly matured. A new resolution and tenacity had entered their eyes, and they had shed much of their youthful immaturity.
At times like this, Fang Cheng would tell them stories of his past experiences in the Cultivation Realm—of the many people he’d met and the things he’d seen, all of which held lessons to be learned.
These stories were imbued with philosophy and worldly wisdom. When the day came for the two youths to travel the Cultivation Realm alone, they would surely be more knowledgeable and more shrewd.
To Fang Cheng’s relief, both boys were humble and eager to learn. They cherished this time with him, frantically absorbing everything they could from him.
The elder, Jingyuan’s, Swordsmanship was already showing hints of his father’s own flair from his youth. The younger, Jingxuan, had astonishing talent in the Array Dao and was bound to achieve great things in his own right.
Just as the father and sons were chatting idly, a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering BOOM suddenly echoed from the sky above.
The three looked up to see a large, pitch-black mass next to the bright moon, streaking toward them with a thunderous roar.
Fang Jingyuan asked in surprise, "Father, what is that?"
Fang Cheng’s mind, however, drifted back to a night he once spent in a chariot on a mountain peak with Hua Yutang. He couldn’t help but smile. "We’re in luck, boys. The Heaven and Earth Boundary Membrane is thin here in the Wilderness, so things like Outer Realm Profound Iron often fall through. I once obtained a piece of Outer Realm Cold Iron the size of a small hill."
’Such a stroke of luck?’
Jingyuan and Jingxuan were filled with curiosity, never imagining they would encounter such a thing today.
Fang Cheng added, "But be careful. These objects that fall from the Outer Void often have Outer Celestial Demons clinging to them. One moment of carelessness, and you’ll end up as food in a Celestial Demon’s mouth."
The two brothers nodded in understanding.
The three focused their gaze and watched as the black mass streaked across the sky before them, then crashed violently into a vast forest of towering trees.
"BOOM!!"
The great earth trembled. Beneath the moonlight, countless towering trees were snapped in two. The ground shook like a rippling wave, kicking up a cloud of dust thousands of feet high that billowed into the air.
Fang Cheng’s eyes narrowed, a flicker of surprise on his face.
That black mass wasn’t some kind of Outer Realm Profound Iron ore—it was a Bodhisattva statue!
The statue’s surface was covered in a dense layer of bizarre, pitch-black, insect-like Celestial Demons, which was why it had appeared as a dark mass from a distance.
"Let’s go take a look!"
With a wave of his wide sleeve, Fang Cheng summoned a Profound Light from the mountaintop and carried the two youths down toward the sea of trees.
Before the three of them could even get close, a black cloud of the bizarre insects swarmed up, exuding a ferocious, tyrannical demonic aura as they flew menacingly toward them.
Fang Cheng snorted, and the cry of a sword rang out, echoing between heaven and earth.
Jingyuan and Jingxuan saw only a flash before their eyes, and then a boundless sea of swords materialized in the sky.
Countless beams of sword light crisscrossed through the air, fanning out in every direction.
Wherever the sword light passed, the bizarre insects perished, their bodies raining down to the ground.
Most of these bizarre insects were Tier One and Tier Two Celestial Demons. There were only two Tier Three Celestial Demons, but Fang Cheng’s sword light had already singled them out, extinguishing their life force in an instant.
In just a few breaths’ time, the sky was suddenly clear.
A pitch-black Demonic Light swept through the area, and the corpses of the bizarre insects burst into flames, turning completely to ash.
The sheer power of the Divine Technique left the two brothers staring, dumbfounded.
’So this is the power of the Life Soul Realm?’
’I have to reach the Life Soul Realm too!’
In that instant, the seed of longing to pursue the Dao took firm root in the two youths’ hearts.
Fang Cheng descended on his Escape Light. Before them, the trees were shattered, and a large, empty clearing had been blasted out of the forest.
In the center of the clearing was a massive crater, nearly a third of a mile wide. Inside the crater lay a Bodhisattva statue, a hundred feet tall.
The Bodhisattva statue had toppled over. It was a pale white color all over, made not of stone, wood, or jade, but of a type of Profound Gold they had never seen before.
Fang Cheng reached out, and an unseen force slowly lifted the Bodhisattva statue upright.
In the moonlight, the Bodhisattva’s true appearance was revealed to them.
It was a Bodhisattva in female form.
The material was lustrous and elegant, exquisitely fine and smooth to the touch. The Bodhisattva had a delicate face with downcast eyes, as if lost in deep contemplation. She was seated upon a rock in a posture of royal ease, with her left leg hanging down and her right leg bent. The folds of her Treasure Robe cascaded in soft, graceful layers. Her entire posture was one of calm elegance, her left hand holding a sacred vase. It was a vision of supreme beauty, untainted by the mortal world.
"How could such a massive Bodhisattva statue fall from the Outer Void?" Fang Jingyuan couldn’t help but ask.
Fang Jingxuan remained silent, his eyes fixed unblinkingly on the Bodhisattva statue as he examined it in thoughtful detail.
Fang Cheng said gravely, "It was likely brought into the Outer Void by a Cultivator from another World Heaven. It must have drifted for ages before finally falling into this realm. However, any Cultivator capable of such a feat would be no ordinary expert..."
Before he could finish, his expression suddenly changed as he looked toward his two sons.
He saw solemn, serene expressions on their faces. In that instant, their very souls were undergoing some strange fluctuation.
Frowning, Fang Cheng pointed a finger, and a sharp beam of sword light shot out, striking the Bodhisattva statue.
CLANG!
A soft layer of Buddha Light materialized, gently deflecting the Tier Five Flying Sword. Faint, indistinct chanting seemed to emanate from behind the statue.
Fang Cheng’s expression flickered. Just as he was about to activate his Flying Sword again, Jingyuan and Jingxuan let out a soft gasp, looking dazed and bewildered, as if waking from a long dream.
Fang Cheng swept his Divine Sense over his sons, carefully checking their condition. He found them to be completely "clean" inside and out, with no abnormalities whatsoever.
"Jingyuan, Jingxuan, did you two feel anything strange just now?" he asked.
An expression of reminiscence crossed Jingyuan’s face. He glanced strangely at the Bodhisattva statue and said to Fang Cheng, "Father, my soul entered a mysterious space. There, I competed in Sword Technique against... you. No, it was an incarnation that resembled you. We must have fought at least a hundred matches before I came out."
Jingxuan added, "I had a similar experience. To think this Bodhisattva statue can generate an illusory space for us to temper our techniques... Buddhist Divine Techniques are truly mysterious and profound!"
Fang Cheng waved his hand, releasing a stream of Li Hen Demon Light to envelop the Bodhisattva statue. He then activated a Mountain Moving Talisman and stored the massive sculpture away.
He said gravely, "This Bodhisattva statue is exceedingly strange. For now, you two are not to go near it. Wait until I’ve figured out what’s going on, and then I’ll let you have it."
...