Who Let Him Cultivate?!

“Really, really.” Lu Yang nodded vigorously, like a chicken pecking at grain.

Yun Zhi weighed the pros and cons of revealing, deciding it wouldn’t hurt to satisfy her junior brother’s curiosity.

“Alright, since you want to know, I’ll tell you. But I must repeat, listen but don’t imitate me.”

“Definitely won’t imitate.” Lu Yang promised.

Fairy Eternity was also quite curious about Yun Zhi’s process of forming the golden core, wondering if this younger generation’s elixir could possibly be superior to her own Invincible Elixir?

“This happened hundreds of years ago…” Yun Zhi drifted into a state of reminiscence.

“Hundreds of years ago?!” blurted out Lu Yang, his tone revealing immense surprise.

Eldest Senior Sister was an exceptional ice beauty in her twenties. Having Lu Yang walking beside her made them look like a pair of siblings. Her treatment of Lu Yang was not that of an elder to a junior, but more of a mature peer. This gave Lu Yang the impression that they were about the same age.

Upon hearing Senior Sister discuss her golden core formation from hundreds of years ago, Lu Yang finally realized that she was the oldest among the disciples. Her real age was much greater than he had imagined.

Just how old is Senior Sister? Hundreds of years old? Could she possibly be near a thousand?

Though the thought process seemed complex, it happened in a flash, as quick as lightning.

These ideas flashed across Lu Yang’s mind. He didn’t even have time to think before voicing his thoughts aloud.

The moment he voiced them, he felt doomed.

Yun Zhi’s gaze slowly landed on Lu Yang’s shoulder. For an instant, he felt as if a sharp knife was poised at his neck, teetering on the edge of death. Death was just a thought away.

Fortunately, the feeling was fleeting. Senior Sister retracted her gaze, not bothered by Lu Yang’s excessive curiosity, and continued.

“Hundreds of years ago, I reached the Foundation Establishment’s late stage, ready to form my golden core.”

“At that time, Master saw my potential and believed I could shoulder great responsibilities. He told me some secrets to prepare for the future. One of them was that the Ancient Nameless One had transformed stars into continents. Most of the stars we see today are mere illusions, the real stars lie beneath our feet.”

It is commonly accepted among cultivators, that only those reaching the Nascent Soul Stage have the qualification to learn that the stars are false. The public and ordinary cultivators should just accept the peace of the world for what it is.

Otherwise, the public and ordinary cultivators would wonder if there would be a second time the Ancient Nameless One would transform continents into stars, resulting in unnecessary worry. It’s better not to tell them.

“I should have told you before that I grew up in a Secret Realm, and only later, left for the Seek Dao Sect.”

Lu Yang nodded. Eldest Senior Sister had mentioned that she had lived in the Secret Realm from a young age, interacted only with cultivators and continued to do so upon arriving at the Seek Dao Sect. As a result, she was not familiar with mortal habits, did not know that people couldn’t bathe in boiling water.

—— This was what Lu Yang was told by Senior Sister after he bathed in boiling water, his skin red and swollen, while she was applying medicine to his burns.

“There was no night sky in the Secret Realm. When I left to enter the outside world, I saw the twinkling stars under the night sky, and found the sight incredibly beautiful.”

“I often lay on the grass counting stars during my free time from cultivation.”

“When Master told me that stars had long disappeared from the sky, I didn’t show it on my face, but I was disappointed.”

“The stars I saw every day were merely phantoms left from 300000 years ago. Once I realized this, I no longer found the night sky beautiful.”

“When I was contemplating what kind of Golden Core to form, I read in ‘The Discourse on the Golden Core’ that ‘Gold represents an everlasting and indestructible substance; Core represents something perfect and flawless.\'”

Lu Yang had a strange idea, Senior Sister, you wouldn’t do something so outrageous, right…?

Only to hear Yun Zhi continue: “At that moment, I thought, isn’t the star I yearn for a flawless and indestructible Golden Core?”

“Since there were no stars, why not replace the stars with Golden Cores, to reproduce the magnificent night sky of the ancient times?”

Lu Yang thought to himself, so Senior Sister, you really did think so.

“Within the Golden Core, the First-Grade is the best, so I formed the Golden Core according to the stars in my mind, thus creating a new kind of First-Grade Golden Core, which I called the Brilliant Star Elixir.”

“At the start, the technique of forming the golden core was a bit rusty. Later, as the number of cores formed increased, the speed of core formation increased as well.”

“During the Golden Core Stage, the main thing I did was continuously form cores, so the number of Golden Cores would match the number of stars in the sky.”

Lu Yang gasped, thinking, Senior Sister, you really do dare to think and act.

“It was challenging to replace the stars with Golden Core during the Golden Core Stage, so when I broke through to the Nascent Soul Stage, I broke one of the Golden Cores to form my Nascent Soul, while keeping the other cores inside me.”

“Later on, when my cultivation succeeded, I took out the Golden Cores from my body one by one, replacing the phantom stars with real ones.”

“Unfortunately, there are too many phantom stars in the night sky. Even though I formed the cores painstakingly, I couldn’t match the number. The number of Golden Cores was far less than the phantom stars.”

“But having some is better than none. Wasn’t the initial hard work aimed at replacing the phantom stars with Golden Cores?”

“So, some of the stars in the sky now… are your Golden Cores?” Lu Yang asked cautiously, out of respect for the unbelievable feats of Senior Sister.

“Only a small part.”

“… Even a small part is quite a lot.”

Lu Yang didn’t know what to say.

Senior Sister wasn’t confident about Lu Yang and warned him again: “My method of forming the core is different from others. Don’t try to imitate me just because you think it’s interesting.”

“Absolutely will not imitate.”

If earlier, Lu Yang’s assurance of not imitating was just perfunctory, now it was his genuine thought.

If one could imitate it, that would be outrageous. One could only imagine the core formation process wasn’t as easy as Senior Sister made it sound.

What did she mean by the more cores you form, the faster the speed? Was this in line with common sense?

No wonder Senior Sister wrote in her core formation experience: “My method of core formation has no reference value, please do not imitate. Those who learn from me die, those who resemble me die.”

Sometimes, Lu Yang felt that the gap between people was even bigger than the gap between humans and dogs.

We are all cultivating, so how come you are the only one who is so outrageous?

“Fairy, can your Invincible Elixir compare to Senior Sister’s?” Lu Yang asked in a whisper.

Fairy Eternity scoffed: “It’s just a bunch of Golden Cores. Even if there are more useless cores, they are still garbage. As the second-in-command of the Immortal Lineage, you must remember, we value quality over quantity. This girl has quantity, but my Golden Core is of high quality. There’s no comparison.”

“Would you dare say this in front of Senior Sister?”

“I wouldn’t.”

She said it confidently.

“…”

Lu Yang thought he could rely on Senior Sister and Fairy Eternity, his two great backbones, to smooth his cultivation path.

But now it seems that neither of these two backbones can be relied on.

Speaking of which, how old is Senior Sister really?