Sage of Humanity

Chapter 314 Training Square

"Are they okay?" Yiyi was somewhat worried.

Although she hadn't felt anything abnormal from Amber, Amber's strength had even increased rapidly in the past few days, Yiyi's worries stemmed from this very unknown.

"Inhaling and exhaling the essence of the sun and the moon, is the instinct of a demon beast."

A voice suddenly came from the side.

Lu Ye and Yiyi hurriedly turned around and together they bowed, "Veteran Bai."

Bai Qian had unknowingly followed them, clearly sensing something unusual here.

"Does Veteran Bai mean that Giant Armor is a demon cultivator?"

Lu Ye thought of Giant Armor's strange "inner core." He had previously suspected whether Giant Armor was a demon cultivator, but evidence proved Giant Armor was human and had no connection to demon cultivators. Moreover, demon cultivators actually do not have inner cores, only demon beasts do.

After transforming into human form, demon cultivators' methods of cultivation are no different from those of the human race.

But now it seemed, his judgment might not have been very accurate.

"One of his ancestors must have been a demon cultivator, perhaps thereby inheriting some aspects of demon cultivator bloodline. However, the bloodline of demon cultivators becomes more diluted with each generation—it shouldn't show such signs of reverting to its original form."

Veteran Bai clearly was a bit puzzled too.

"However, Yiye my friend, your two companions are worth cultivating diligently. Although inhaling and exhaling the essence of the sun and the moon is the instinct of a demon beast, not all demon beasts possess such ability. Those who can cultivate themselves in this way are invariably exotic beasts with peculiar bloodlines, and their ancestors may have significant backgrounds," Veteran Bai remarked.

From these words of Veteran Bai, it was clear he held Giant Armor and Amber in high regard.

Amber, needless to say, aside from him, Lu Ye had not heard of any other tiger demon beast capable of transforming minion spirits, and his consumption of elixir pills for cultivation contained no side effects. Not only that, Amber could even directly consume Spirit Stones...

That was something even Lu Ye couldn't do.

Giant Armor was exceptionally talented by nature, and Lu Ye was very optimistic about his future. Now that he had revealed such unique abilities, perhaps it was as Veteran Bai had said, Giant Armor's ancestors really had significant backgrounds.

"But Veteran Bai, Giant Armor had never shown such talents before, why recently..."

Bai Qian chuckled, raised his hand, and tapped his head, "Don't forget, he was poisoned with a psyche toxin a few days ago and was unconscious for several days; perhaps it awakened something in him."

Lu Ye nodded; this indeed was an explanation.

"I'm old and lack the energy; I'll go rest now." Bai Qian turned and started for his dwelling, coughing lightly a few times.

Lu Ye chuckled inwardly, aware of the underlying message in his words, but chose not to pursue it, and said to Yiyi, "Let's see Veteran Bai off."

"Mhm," Yiyi quickly responded.

A moment later, Yiyi returned and stood beside Lu Ye, looking around and murmured softly, "Lu Ye, do you think Veteran Bai's words are right?"

"Which aspect?"

"Veteran Bai said that because Giant Armor was poisoned, he awakened something."

"If Veteran Bai said so, he naturally has his judgment."

"No wonder I've felt that Giant Armor has been acting strangely these days, he was already not much of a talker, but now he speaks even less, and seems more sluggish than before."

"Giant Armor is certainly not sluggish." Lu Ye raised his hand to tap on her head; Giant Armor might be simple, but that didn't mean he was stupid.

Yiyi held her head with both hands, pouting.

"Alright, don't worry about them." Lu Ye called out and returned to his own dwelling to continue reading and cultivating.

The Array Path is vast and profound; even someone like Veteran Bai couldn't claim to fully understand it. It's just like the Path of Spirit Runes, an endless field of study.

It was impossible for Lu Ye to completely master the nuances of the Array Path in a short time.

Luckily, Veteran Bai knew what Lu Ye wanted to do, so during these days, he mostly taught him the experiences of array destruction.

These experiences were all personal insights of Veteran Bai, not easily shared with others.

And Lu Ye's progress on the Array Path had undoubtedly pleased Veteran Bai, who had taught so many disciples over the years at the Tianyan Sect, yet never had anyone who grasped the concepts as quickly as Lu Ye did.

Sometimes Veteran Bai felt a sense of regret, thinking that if Lu Ye had been born into the Tianyan Sect, he could've brought great glory to the sect with his talent in the Array Path.

This was also one of the reasons why he had taught without reservation, as he couldn't bear to see such raw talent go to waste.

In the hurried months at Veteran Bai's dwelling, a voice arose, "I know your heart isn't set on the Array Path, studying it is merely to dismantle those protective arrays. With your current expertise, trying to challenge the Hundred Arrays Pagoda again should now be feasible. There's not much more I can teach you; however, the training in Array Path is endless. If you find free time in the future, you can still devote some thought to it."

"Yes," Lu Ye respectfully responded.

"Think tonight about what array banners you need to construct; tomorrow I'll take you to make them. Once everything is prepared, you can challenge the Hundred Arrays Pagoda."

When Lu Ye first heard about the Hundred Arrays Pagoda from Zhao Li, he thought he could directly challenge it, but as he learned under Veteran Bai over the month, he slowly realized that things were not as simple as he had thought.

While he could directly challenge it, it certainly wouldn't be efficient. If he had the appropriate array banners to assist him, both array destruction and array setup would be greatly improved.

"Thank you, Veteran Bai," Lu Ye said as he took out a jade vial from his storage sack and pushed it toward Veteran Bai, "Veteran Bai has not rejected teaching me over these days. As a disciple, I have nothing to repay you with; this is a small token of my appreciation, please do not refuse it."

The jade vial naturally contained Soul Cleansing Water, but it was not a full vial—rather, it contained eight drops.

This wasn't a whim of Lu Ye's. The sect master had instructed him to prepare this gift after learning that Veteran Bai was personally teaching Lu Ye. The quantity of eight drops had also been decided by the sect master.

Given that the Tianyan Sect had experts specialized in the Array Path, there was no need for Veteran Bai to personally teach Lu Ye—one from the Cloud River Realm would suffice.

Veteran Bai had stepped in partly because the Righteous Blood Sect had some connection with the Tianyan Sect and partly because Zhao Li had been saved by Shui Yuan's intervention.

But that wasn't the main reason.

The primary reason was that Lu Ye possessed Soul Cleansing Water.

It would not be appropriate for him to directly ask for it, nor proper to make any trade with Lu Ye, so he simply did his part first.

Lu Ye, having offered Soul Cleansing Water to save Zhao Li, clearly wasn't ungrateful. By diligently teaching him the Array Path, was there any doubt that Lu Ye would show his gratitude?

Being in the Spirit Stream Realm and wanting to thank someone in the Divine Sea Realm, the only thing he could offer was Soul Cleansing Water.

This was the covert plan of Bai Qian, and it was a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

After the sect master heard that it was indeed Bai Qian teaching Lu Ye, he immediately perceived his intentions, which was why he had instructed Lu Ye in advance.

That night, under Yiyi's guidance, Lu Ye had gone to watch Giant Armor and Amber absorb the essence of the moon for cultivation. Just before leaving, Bai Qian had casually mentioned something about being old and lacking energy, which Lu Ye wouldn't have thought much about if not for the sect master's prior instruction. Now he knew it was a hint from Bai Qian.

Though he was old, his cultivation was there to be seen; a few steps at night wouldn't exactly deplete his energy.

Looking at the jade vial in front of him, Bai Qian's heart skipped a beat, and he chuckled, "Well then, I shall not decline out of respect."

The next day, under Bai Qian's lead, Lu Ye and he went together to the Tianyan Sect's training square, a crucial area of the sect. Discover exclusive tales on My Virtual Library Empire

The training square was usually bustling with people, as Tianyan Sect disciples who had reached a certain level in their cultivation of the Array Path would customarily come here to craft their own array bases and array banners.

However, the place was deserted today; the normally busy training square was void of any visitors.

Naturally, this was Bai Qian's doing, mainly to prevent the news of Lu Ye still being alive from leaking.

Located at the base of a spirit mountaintop about a hundred yards underground, the training square was accessible directly through a wooden elevator, and as Bai Qian stood on it descending straight down, Lu Ye looked around and saw many interlocking gears.

This must be the work of a cover armorer.

The deeper they went, the hotter the environment became.

By the time they reached a hundred yards down, the environment around was harsh enough to make any ordinary person retreat.

The underground was carved out by the Tianyan Sect into various big and small spaces, from which waves of heat continuously emerged.

Following Bai Qian, the two walked to the very back of a cavern, arriving in front of a training platform.

This was a massive device three yards long and one yard wide, equipped with facilities for hammering weapon substrates and many differently shaped moulds embedded within it. From the shapes of those moulds, it was clear that this training platform could be used for more than just crafting array bases and array banners.

There were also many artifact-making tools placed beside it.

In front of the training platform was a furnace, beneath which more hot air surged up.

"Does the Tianyan Sect also refine Spiritual Artifacts?" Lu Ye looked at the shapes of the moulds on the training platform.

Bai Qian chuckled, "Disciples consume a lot during cultivation and always need some income to sustain themselves. Our sect has some Artifact Refiners, but the Spiritual Artifacts they make are not very high-grade, just sufficient to get by."

Saying so, he took off his robe and casually threw it to the side, revealing his muscular upper body.

Lu Ye's eyes twitched at the sight of this robust figure, recalling how Bai Qian had mentioned being out of energy the other night…

"Since you need to break arrays, let's craft an array banner for this purpose. I'll make one first; you carefully observe on the side," said Bai Qian, picking up an artifact-making hammer which didn't look very large but was clearly heavy. Yet, in Bai Qian's hands, it seemed as light as a feather.

"The so-called artifact crafting requires fire initially. Given that you are predominantly of the Fire Element and have cultivated a fire-type technique, you naturally have an innate advantage in this area. But what about those who don't have your conditions? They need to rely on external fire. Our sect's training square is located here because we have Earth Fire, which we draw in through an Array, allowing us to borrow its power," explained Bai Qian as he activated the Fire-Drawing Array arranged there. Soon, the cavern became even hotter, and visible Earth Fire surged from below, turning the furnace red-hot.

Looking at the Earth Fire, Lu Ye was moved; he could feel that his Talent Tree could absorb its power. He had also previously bought many portions of Earth's Core Fire from the Heaven's Augury treasure vault. The Earth Fire he was experiencing now felt very similar to Earth's Core Fire.

However, in terms of quality, the Earth Fire being manipulated by Bai Qian was much inferior to the Earth's Core Fire that Lu Ye had bought from Heaven's Augury treasure vault.