30 The Stone of Kong Ming

He walked up to the girls. "Are we finished here?" he asked them.

"Yes we gathered almost everything," Xiao Ning'er said. "What was that white light?" Ye Ziyun also looked interested.

"Remnant soul force of some old expert, possibly emperor Kong Ming." Nie Li said to satisfy their curiosity. "But the coffin is empty. There's no corpse inside."

"Oh" girls carefully walked towards it. With its energy spent, restrictions disappeared as well. And girls wanted to see the coffin of an ancient expert that had possibly transcended the bounds of mortality. They were a bit disappointed. It was an ordinary empty stone coffin. All of its grandeur disappeared.

"Let's go. There should be other treasure chambers out there. This underground palace is big" Nie Li urged them to continue. If they hurry, they could be finished by the end of the day. He knew where the treasury was located, so it shouldn't take long.

They headed towards the opposite exit from where they came from. Nie Li's mental map showed that training grounds should be in that direction. But after walking a couple of steps Nie Li suddenly stopped. His background scan caught something.

He noticed faint energy fluctuations from the pedestal under the coffin. It was undetectable while the array over the coffin lid was active. It was a very clever way to hide something. It's difficult to see stars when the sun is in the sky.

Girls looked dumbfounded as Nie Li returned to the coffin and walked around it looking for something. Their own spiritual senses weren't strong enough to notice the concealing array under the coffin. There really was another inscription array hiding something under the stone pedestal.

Nie Li put his hand on the stone pedestal and poured some soul force into it. After a moment a stone grinding sound was heard and the coffin slid to the side opening a dark passage with stairs under it.

Girls gasped. They didn't expect that there was another secret hidden here. How did Nie Li notice it? This treasure hunting is turning out to be so exciting.

"Okay let's see what they were hiding here," said Nie Li and walked down the stairs. He was excited as well. Because this wasn't in the novel. If he hadn't been using his spiritual senses at max he would have missed it.

Girls followed behind him. It wasn't long before they noticed a light in front of them. Stairs ended opening a small chamber with a big glowing crystal and a stone monument illuminated by it.

Nie Li stopped dead in his tracks seeing the stone monument. `It shouldn't be here,` he thought. But after a moment his panicking subsided. This was not the same monument from the Abyss Prison realm. It was much smaller and there weren't any chants on it, only the writing in the Sacred Empire Era language.

It said: "Those who follow me, shall be honored. Those who oppose me shall perish. In my lifetime I was gifted with extraordinary talent. Started to comprehend at the age of ten, splitting mountains and scattering stones. Comprehended the gentle realm at the age of thirteen, drying a river at the wave of a hand. At the age of thirty, no one under the sky could withstand three of my strikes. Battling all supreme experts around the world never tasted defeat. Comprehended the realm of man at the age of forty, opened the wisdom, knowing the past and present. At the age of fifty sensed a calamity arriving, abandoned the throne, and left."

Nie Li looked at it warily. Was this another type of inheritance? Was it inevitable for him to become Kong Ming's disciple? He didn't want to risk that much. He carefully scanned the glowing crystal. It was half a meter long prism-shaped crystal. It was radiating simply an impossible amount of energy. But something about the energy was familiar. Nie Li decided to risk and approached the crystal to have a closer look.

Only then did Nie Li notice why the energy felt familiar. It was the Power of Heaven! The Power of Heaven in this world? This was impossible. The Divine Continent's laws didn't allow Heavenly Energy to exist. That's why there was no Heavenly Fate realm cultivator in this world. Spiritual gods used their own type of energy called Power of Law and it was lower order energy compared to Power of Heaven.

Inspecting it closer he noticed a peculiarity. The Heavenly Energy leaving the crystal turned into an ordinary soul force and was absorbed into the crystal again. Then the crystal transformed it back into Heavenly Energy. It looks like the crystal not only holds the Heavenly Energy but generates it as well. It absorbs other types of energy and turns them into the Power of Heaven.

It was a great treasure in any world except the Draconic Ruins Realm and the Tiny World. Because one could cultivate the Heavenly Fate realm by absorbing its power. In the lower worlds of the Draconic Ruins Realm, the Power of Heaven was very rare so barely anyone could reach Heavenly Fate rank. With this crystal's help, they could cultivate many times faster.

But in this world, no Heavenly Energy could exist. Any power which leaves the crystal turns into the ordinary soul force making it impossible to cultivate the Power of Heaven. It was just a glorified battery here. And in the Draconic Ruins Realm Heavenly energy was in abundance so the meager energy it produced was not as valuable. If Nie Li couldn't find a way to absorb its Heavenly energy, the only thing it could be useful was for comprehending the nature of the Power of Heaven. It would at least allow him to half step into Heavenly Fate realm even in this world.

'It's actually not bad.' Nie Li thought. Finding a Heavenly Energy source in this world was a great fortune. The only thing he remembered holding that type of energy was the Nightmare Demon Pot, but accessing that energy was very problematic. It could also explain the dramatic rise of the Demon Lord's power in the novel. His old self's memories have no indication of the Demon Lord reaching the Draconic Ruins Realm so he most likely stayed in this world. But in the novel, he had become the strongest existence in this world below the Spiritual Gods.

If the Dark Guild explored this Underground Palace after Nie Li left they could have found this crystal. (Nie Li wasn't mistaken. The Dark Guild found this crystal and named it the Stone of Kong Ming. They used a piece of it to summon the Abyss Demon during the Dark Guild's attack on the City Lord's Mansion.)

Nie Li turned towards the girls who were waiting patiently at the entrance of the chamber. They noticed how Nie Li became guarded when he noticed the crystal and the Stone Monument so they didn't want to interrupt his inspection.

"What's it?" asked Xiao Ning'er seeing that Nie Li was finished.

"It's a source of higher-order energy than the soul force. It's thousands of times denser." Nie Li explained. He didn't want to lie to them but didn't plan to tell them everything either. "Ziyun, Ning'er, in exchange for this crystal I give up my share of the treasures found above," he said.

"Oh, there is no need. We couldn't have found this place without you anyway," said Ye Ziyun. Xiao Ning'er nodded agreeing with her. While they were curious about the crystal, they understood that it was only due to him they have reached this place. So they couldn't shamelessly demand a share.

Nie Li thanked them and put the crystal in his interspatial ring. And then approached the stone monument. Even though he was cautious his curiosity won over in the end. He wanted to know more about the crystal. Even his old self had never seen something like that. Where did Kong Ming get it? Was it some kind of meteor, like it was with Yu Yan?

His hand touched the stone and a mysterious inscription pattern slowly spread out onto it. But there were no results. If there was some memory intent left behind it had been washed away by the energy waves from the Heavenly Energy Crystal. Nie Li decided to call it like that.

Even though he couldn't find anything about the crystal, he was somewhat relieved that there was no hidden inheritance here.