Who Let Him Cultivate?!

Those people in the shadows, they only saw Yun Zhi as greatly talented and extraordinarily strong, but they didn’t have the slightest idea of what Yun Zhi’s “strength” truly meant.

If they knew how formidable Yun Zhi is, they would realize how foolish this scheme of driving a wedge between them was.

“Eldest Senior Sister, where are we heading to?” Lu Yang asked, noticing that after arriving at the Seek Dao Sect, she continued flying past Sky Gate Mountain without stopping.

Lu Yang had never set foot here before. Below them were vast mountains and marshes, the great draught, and the yellow desert.

“Captive Peak.”

Both Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou hadn’t heard of this place before.

The Eldest Senior Sister flew over these areas, descending on a gloomy peak. The mountain was entwined by massive chains, which bound to four mountains in each direction. Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou felt chills going down their spines, sensing this was not a good place.

Lu Yang had learned a bit about Array Methods, which emphasizes “unimpeded flow”. At a minimum, at least one direction should be connected to the outside world to maintain life energy. Yet, Captive Peak was encircled by mountains on all sides, shutting off any trace of life. The tight cluster of clouds draped over and sealed this region completely.

Captive Peak was a place to imprison and interrogate criminals.

The three of them landed. Yun Zhi opened the Array Method’s entrance and headed downwards to about five kilometers below, carrying two Unification-stage souls with her.

Prisoners were held beneath Captive Peak.

Upon arriving at Captive Peak, both Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou had a feeling of returning to Buyi Town, powerless to mobilize Spiritual Energy. It was not the Forbidden Spirit Array causing this, but a different kind of “Rule”.

They noticed almost a hundred cages here, most of them empty. Only a handful held inhabitants.

To be more accurate, what was being held were not people, but souls. These souls, under the suppression of the “Rule”, were spiritless and disheartened.

Some souls, seeing Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou, began drooling, wishing they could rush forward and devour them, but they piped down at the sight of the Eldest Senior Sister.

Lu Yang felt that the number of people imprisoned here was too few. More people were held in the dungeons of Yanjiang County.

“All those held here are from the ancient Unification phase. Be careful,” Yun Zhi warned.

The two of them shuddered suddenly, no longer thinking the place was underpopulated.

Holy smokes, more than a dozen Unification tier individuals were actually kept here?

“Eldest Senior Sister, aren’t you afraid they will escape?” Lu Yang asked in a low voice.

“Escape? You think too little of me, young man.” A childish voice responded. Lu Yang turned at the sound and saw a white-haired child, just about waist-high to him.

“Grandmaster.”

Much to their surprise, the white-haired child turned out to be Daoist Buyu’s master.

“Grandmaster,” both cried out in surprise.

“Hehe, do you think I’m too small?”

“No, no.”

The white-haired child spoke with an air of authority, “You two are still too young, not worldly enough to understand my state. This is a way of cultivation.”

Lu Yang quickly recalled a legendary quotation, “The ancients say, ‘Stay true to your constant virtue and return to the state of an infant’. The masses are bustling about as if feasting on a sacrificial ox, or ascending the terrace in spring, I alone appear uncommitted and dejected, like an infant before it can smile.”

“Many great cultivators strive their entire lives to pursue the innocuous mind of an infant. But the intentional desire itself is hardly an infant-like thought. How can they truly achieve the mind state of an infant?”

“Could it be, Grandmaster, that you’ve returned to the stage of an ‘infant’ and have reached the stage of natural truth, the unison of heaven and man, with an infant’s heart?” Lu Yang asked.

Meng Jingzhou was also surprised. The infant’s heart has always been a fable. No one in Meng Family’s older generation could reach this state of mind. Who would have thought the Seek Dao Sect would have one?

The white-haired child smiled and nodded without uttering a word, showing a teachable expression.

Yun Zhi looked puzzled, “But that’s not what I heard.”

“Master once said that when you were young, you were a playboy, spending all your time in brothels, neglecting your cultivation. Then, you had a sudden realization and determined to engage in cultivation. To stay your course, you froze your body at the age of six forever, so you wouldn’t have to worry about leaking your Yang Qi.”

Lu Yang: “…”

Meng Jingzhou: “…”

Strictly speaking, this was indeed a mode of cultivation.

They realized that cultivators, once reaching a certain realm, could control their appearance. So why did some cultivators choose to maintain the appearance of a juvenile or an old man? Could it be for the same reason as the Grandmaster’s?

No, no, no, they quickly emptied their minds, not daring to ponder further on this matter.

“Anyway, with me here, not a single Unification phase person imprisoned here can escape!” The white-haired child forcefully changed the topic, “Miss Yun, you caught two more?”

“Yes, I need to interrogate them.”

“Why not search their souls directly?” the white-haired child suggested.

Yun Zhi shook her head, “Soul searching will damage their minds. The souls of the Unification phase are prime materials for forging magic artifacts. A mindless soul greatly reduces the artifact’s effects.”

The two Unification phase souls shivered. Weren’t the Seek Dao Sect supposed to be a Righteous Sect? This was not what they’d pictured at all!

Yun Zhi looked at the two Unification stages in confusion, not comprehending their fear, “You’ve caused so many people to die in fear, isn’t it normal for you to experience the same treatment now?”

Do not do unto others what you would not want others to do onto you, Yun Zhi had thought these two had long understood this principle.

Yun Zhi and the white-haired child each took a Unification phase soul and threw them into the cages. Lu Yang followed Yun Zhi and Meng Jingzhou followed the white-haired child.

Yun Zhi deployed a series of intensive tortures right from the start, employing all kinds of torture tools designed for souls. The prisoner cried out in pain continuously. Lu Yang’s eyes twitched as he watched, he didn’t expect the Eldest Senior Sister to be so ruthless.

Wait a minute, it seemed like when he started his cultivation, the Eldest Senior Sister did exactly the same?

Could it be that the Eldest Senior Sister had applied the experience of torture interrogation to his cultivation training?

Fairy Eternity shivered each time she saw the Eldest Senior Sister using a torture device. She felt that joining the Seek Dao Sect was indeed a wise decision.

The Seek Dao Sect wouldn’t be so cruel to their own people, right?

“Strange, why has he not confessed anything yet?” Yun Zhi was puzzled. Her grandmaster had told her that following this procedure, the criminal would surely confess everything.

Lu Yang whispered aside, “Eldest Senior Sister, you haven’t asked anything yet.”

Yun Zhi exclaimed in realization, picked up the first torture tool, and prepared to start the whole process again. The fright made the captive quickly refrain, “No no no, I confess, I confess everything.”

“What era are you from?”

“The era of Great Yu, 4.0,000 years ago.”

“Have you heard of Immortal Eternity or Fairy Eternity?”

“No, never.”

“Really? Still lying?”

The man was nearly in tears from Yun Zhi’s cold expression, “It’s true, I’ve never heard of them. In our era, we’d only heard that the Western Buddha Country and the Southern Demon Realm had immortals. There were rumors of immortals in the Eastern Ocean and the extreme north, but I don’t even know a single immortal’s name.”

“If you are looking for an ‘Immortal Eternity’, you can try the extreme north. Maybe an immortal is frozen there, that counts as ‘Eternity’.”

Fairy Eternity was so angry she wanted to roll up her sleeves and start a fight right there.