Chapter 117: Returning to Sun Moon Village
On the edge of the Eastern Continent, in Dragon Ridge.
Standing here again, Mingyan felt a sense of nostalgia.
Back then, he had only been at the Gathering Stream Realm, fleeing from Yun Ling with Huang Feiyan…
If it were now, he wouldn’t need to run. Yun Ling would be the one fleeing.
Mingyan walked through Dragon Ridge, picked a few Dragon’s Blood Flowers, and carefully sensed the faint dragon blood within…
Now, he could clearly tell that the Yang energy in the flowers was far inferior to the Yang energy in his own blood. He refined them into healing medicine and then went to Rain Terrace Mountain.
After half of it had been cut off, Rain Terrace Mountain had lost its status as a Blessed Land. However, the spiritual energy here was still richer than in the surrounding areas, but no one had claimed it.
When Yue Wu Xia had led the people of Rain Terrace Blessed Land away, she had left a restriction here, preventing those with low cultivation from approaching.
Mingyan didn’t enter but simply looked at it from a distance, then turned and left.
He would visit the new Rain Terrace Blessed Land on his way back to the Sacred Land.
He headed towards his destination: Sun Moon Village.
Sun Moon Village was on the edge of Dragon Ridge, quite far from the former Rain Terrace Blessed Land. But with his current cultivation, it didn’t take him long to arrive.
The village was filled with small mud huts. The fields were uncultivated and overgrown with weeds.
He walked into the village. The grains that had been drying in front of a mud hut on the left had long since rotted and turned black. The door of the hut was open, and weeds grew inside.
The entire village was silent, lifeless, filled with a deathly stillness.
He walked through the village and reached the cemetery behind it.
This place had originally been for burying the deceased of the village. Now, dozens of new tombstones stood here.
He went to the village chief’s tombstone. It was covered in moss. He wiped it clean, looked at the tombstone, and was silent for a long time. He then took out the peach blossom wine Huang Qingfei had given him and poured it in front of the tombstone.
The fragrance of the wine filled the air. He wondered if the village chief’s spirit would like it.
He didn’t pour it all out, leaving a large portion, then recapped it and placed it in front of the tombstone.
The village chief had raised him and had been very kind to him. It was a pity he had passed away before Mingyan could repay his kindness.
He knelt before the tombstone and kowtowed, thanking the village chief for raising him.
He stood up, left the cemetery, and began to observe the village.
He hadn’t noticed it before, but now, he saw something surprising about the village’s layout.
Sun Moon Village had two wells. One had cool, refreshing water, the other had naturally hot water, suitable for bathing. One cold, one warm. A river flowed from top to bottom, dividing the village in half.
He leaped into the air. Although he couldn’t fly yet, he could stay airborne for a while.
From above, he could clearly see the village’s strange layout.
It was divided in half by the river, with the two wells on either side, facing each other, like the lesser Yin and lesser Yang in a Tai Chi Yin-Yang symbol.
And the river was like the dividing line in the Yin-Yang symbol.
He landed, feeling the strangeness of this place.
He didn’t rush to find the river’s source but went to the cold well and jumped in.
The well wasn’t deep and was connected to an underground river. The water was cool and refreshing, but that was it. He found nothing else. He then explored the hot well and also found nothing unusual.
He returned to the surface and dried himself off, puzzled.
From above, the place looked mystical, but upon closer inspection, he found nothing. Was his cultivation too low to see anything? He decided not to dwell on it and followed the river upstream.
The river had a unique name, the Dividing River, passed down from ancient times, likely because it divided the village in half.
He followed it upstream, searching for its source. He had been found floating down the river. If he had parents, they must have placed him upstream.
He was lucky not to have drowned.
Upstream, he found no signs of human settlement. It was a secluded place, with dense vegetation. Even ferocious beasts rarely came here, or they would have left some traces.
He didn’t give up and continued upstream.
He reached the foot of a mountain and saw a river flowing out of a cave. He felt a strange sensation.
Something was calling to him, a feeling similar to what he had felt when he saw the Peak Human King Physique in the “#” symbol…
It felt intimate, as if he had a blood connection to it, as if they were from the same source.
Without hesitation, he entered the cave.
The cave wasn’t long. He soon reached a dead end and had to dive into the water. He swam for a long time until he hit a restriction and surfaced.
He looked up and saw a stone gate, massive and unadorned, with a familiar story carved on it, the same story he had seen in the Supreme Dao Hall.
It was the story of a supreme being unifying the human cultivation system. Why was it here? He dived back into the water and noticed something strange.
He could see the water flowing from ahead, but he couldn’t move forward. There was an invisible wall blocking his way. It was dark inside, and he couldn’t see anything.
Above the water, there was a large stone slab, and the stone gate stood on it, blocking the way forward.
He thought for a moment, then leaped out of the water and stood before the stone gate.
Why was there a stone gate here… He touched it. It was cold. He tried to push it, but it was incredibly heavy, and he couldn’t move it at all.
He realized brute force wouldn’t work. He stepped back and examined the gate.
Half of the carvings had been erased, leaving only the story he had seen in the Supreme Dao Hall.
He didn’t know what the other half depicted, or why it had been erased.
This being… was likely the Human King Physique who had created the current cultivation system…
This place was definitely related to the Human King Physique. He scanned the gate and noticed something strange.
There were two empty slots on the gate, one shaped like a “*” and the other like a “#”. He realized what he had to do and took out the two symbols from his Qi Sea, placing them in the slots.
But nothing happened. He was puzzled. Was this not it?
Did it need to be activated in some other way?
He thought for a moment, then pricked his finger and touched the two slots.
The ground trembled! The two symbols, stained with his blood, began to glow faintly, runes flashing on them. The stone gate also began to glow with faint patterns, then slowly opened.
