Chapter 78: Cave Emanating Such Powerful Thunder Energy (3)
The Foundation Establishment cultivator passed without reacting to the cave.
High above the mountain range, the young man continued his leisurely flight upon his glowing sword. He grew smaller and smaller on the horizon, casually sipping his wine, completely oblivious to the fact that he had just flown over a powerful power source. He did not cast a single downward glance. He did not shiver from any oppressive spiritual aura. He simply drifted through the sky, entirely unbothered.
To Lin Yuan, this observation could only mean one thing.
The cultivator above couldn’t perceive the terrifying thunder aura emanating from this cave.
To him, this cavern was nothing more than a mundane, unremarkable hole carved into a dead mountain, a place so ordinary that it wasn’t even worth sparing a second glance. It was fundamentally beneath the attention of any cultivator passing through the area.
But why is that the case? Lin Yuan thought, his sharp mind racing to untangle the matter.
Determined to uncover the truth, Lin Yuan immediately shifted his posture. Ignoring the throbbing ache coursing through his body, he sat cross-legged directly on the mountain path. He slowly closed his eyes, shutting out the physical world around him and turning his entire consciousness inward.
The energy radiating from the pitch-black maw of the cavern was unquestionably thunder in nature. It was violent, absolute, and carried a suppressive weight that seemed intent on crushing anything that dared approach it. However, Lin Yuan wasn’t satisfied with merely identifying the nature of the energy. He wanted to understand its origin, its essence, and, most importantly, why that cultivator who had passed by earlier had failed to react to it.
And with his Dao Rhythm—the Dao aura he had cultivated from absorbing the Dao intent within the Mountain and River Painting—he should be able to safely resonate with the thunder energy!
"If it is the essence of thunder, then it must answer to the my origin of thunder," Lin Yuan murmured softly, his voice quickly swallowed by the desolate mountain wind.
He slowed his breathing, painstakingly syncing his rhythm to the terrifying pulse emanating from the cave. He did not extend his divine sense aggressively this time; he had already learned the hard way that trying to pierce this specific veil with brute spiritual force would result in instantaneous backlash. Instead, he pushed his comprehension to its absolute limit, enveloping his consciousness in the perfectly balanced essence of his Thunder Rain Dao.
Slowly, and carefully, like someone reaching out to touch a sleeping dragon, he cast a fragile thread of his Dao Rhythm toward the darkness of the cave.
The very moment his Dao Rhythm brushed against the threshold of the cave, the violent rejection he had experienced earlier did not occur. This time, Lin Yuan approached with the Dao Rhythm he had grasped after entering the Mountain and Rivers Painting, allowing his presence to subtly resonate with the energy within the cavern.
As he achieved this delicate and perilous synchronization, Lin Yuan’s consciousness slowly extended into the shallow depths of the cavern. His extraordinary comprehension immediately began dissecting the aura, breaking it down layer by layer until he could perceive its most fundamental principles.
What he discovered caused his heart to skip a beat.
As he analyzed the aura, he quickly noticed that this thunder energy was fundamentally different from anything in the outside world. It was not composed of Spiritual Qi, nor was it the destructive Qi that fell from the heavens during a tribulation.
This overwhelming presence was almost entirely made up of pure Origin Qi!
"Impressive... truly, terrifyingly impressive," Lin Yuan breathed out, his eyes snapping open as a profound shock rippled through his entire being.
Origin Qi! It was the absolute soup of the cosmos. It was the root energy that existed before the universe cooled, before the Heavenly Dao established its countless laws, and before energy fragmented into the myriad elemental laws that cultivators relied upon today. Whatever was resting deep inside the belly of that mundane mountain was actively emanating Origin Energy of the thunder nature!
But what in the heavens could that possibly be? The possibilities were as endless as they were terrifying, and each one represented a treasure powerful enough to completely overturn the balance of power in Azure Cloud City... No, not merely the city.
The entire province!
The realization cascaded through Lin Yuan’s mind, connecting all the disparate clues into a single conclusion.
So, this was the reason why Lin Yuan was able to sense it, while the Foundation Establishment cultivator and possibly the rest of the city completely missed it! The thunder energy was mostly composed of Origin Qi!
To the average cultivator, the entire world was viewed strictly through the narrow lens of Spiritual Qi. Their Golden Cores, their meridians, their artifacts, and their martial techniques were entirely built upon refining and manipulating the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. If an object, a beast, or a location did not emit Spiritual Qi, it was effectively invisible to their senses, registering only as mundane rock, dead wood, or empty air.
But Lin Yuan’s perception had been altered.
Since touching the "origin" when he perfectly merged his Thunder Dao and his Rain Dao in the Mountain and River Painting, his consciousness had changed. While suspended in that void, watching stars detonate and new life bloom, he had grasped the absolute root of cause and effect. Because of that heaven-defying enlightenment, his consciousness now naturally reacts to Origin Energy, exactly in the same manner that other cultivators react to ambient Spiritual Qi!
When Lin Yuan had first flown over the mountain, his senses had unconsciously reacted to the aura emanating from the cave as though it were ordinary spiritual qi. Only after carefully examining it did he realize the truth. It was not spiritual qi at all, but Origin Qi.
Yet that did not diminish the terrifying power of the thunder energy contained within it. Others might be completely unable to perceive the aura, but that did not mean they could safely enter the cave. The moment they crossed the threshold, the thunderous Origin Qi would still erupt with enough force to instantly destroy them.
It was like food that gave off no foul smell, yet tasted utterly rotten the moment it touched the tongue. The absence of a detectable aura did not mean the danger itself was absent.
Also since the aura source was of origin Qi, it meant, naturally, if one is not of the Soul Transformation realm, they would never, ever naturally notice the energy coming from the cave.
In the grand way of cultivation, perceiving and interacting with Origin Qi was an absolute impossibility for anyone below the Soul Transformation realm. At the Nascent Soul stage, a cultivator’s soul, while incredibly powerful, was still fundamentally tethered to the physical laws of the lower world. It was only after breaking through the Spirit Severing realm, violently shedding their mortal attachments, and ascending to Soul Transformation that a cultivator could successfully forge a Primordial Spirit.
Only a Primordial Spirit—a soul that had fully transcended and aligned itself entirely with the Greater Dao—possessed the required power to be conscious of Origin Energy.
Yet, against all things, Lin Yuan had bridged that impossible gap. Lin Yuan only noticed that terrifying aura because he was able to touch the origin that came off from the specific intersection within his Thunder Rain Dao! His sheer perception had vastly outpaced his actual cultivation realm, granting him the perception of a Soul Transformation monster while his cultivation remained at the Early Stage of the Nascent Soul realm.