Breakthrough

This is a dimly lit cave, tall enough to accommodate a Rakshasa, whose height far exceeds that of ordinary humans.

Entering the cave, Harry began to explore.

During his first demon-slaying, his mind was completely immersed in swordsmanship, devoid of any feelings.

Now, however, after his first demon-slaying experience, the excitement of looting treasures stirred his spirits.

The cave seemed empty at first glance, as if there was nothing.

But Harry refused to believe that this Rakshasa had nothing valuable.

There's a knack to looting treasures, learned back on the Northern Peak of Sworthy Mountain, and now being put to use.

Underground demons like to bury things underground, and Harry didn't want to use his precious Culti-Me Sword to dig. 

So he found a sharp stone and began digging into the ground using his mana.

Huh.

A spiritual stone.

Harry immediately recognized the slightly blackish square stone the size of a fingertip as a spiritual stone, likely of inferior quality.

Spiritual stones from the underground world tended to be slightly blackish, unlike those from the surface world, which were mostly white.

One after another, Harry dug out over twenty of these spiritual stones. 

Jackpot.

Harry realized he hit the jackpot.

Back on the Northern Peak, he'd only get about ten of these in a year.

Now, he had over twenty in one go.

Looting demon treasures like this was a fast way to obtain spiritual stones, but it came with great risks. If you couldn't defeat the demon, you'd end up being the one slain. 

He carefully placed the twenty-two inferior spiritual stones into his bag.

Then, he continued digging.

After a while, he unearthed an iron fork.

This fork, made of dark iron, likely belonged to the Rakshasa, but since Harry only used a sword, he discarded it aside.

Continuing to dig, Harry found all sorts of oddities: claws, hair, and nails of unknown origin.

It seemed the Rakshasa was a collector of sorts, but Harry had no use for these oddities and threw them away.

Huh, what's this iron plate?

The iron plate felt warm in his hand, unlike regular iron which was cold.

It was palm-sized and covered in engravings of strange creatures, most of which Harry had never seen before. There was a seal on the front.

A sealing plate?

Between heaven and earth exists a thing called spiritual beasts.

These beasts are naturally nurtured by the environment and nature, such as clouds accumulating in the sky for a long time to birth a cloud-based spiritual beast.

In the earliest times, during the initial formation of heaven and earth, there were abundant spiritual beasts, which could be found almost everywhere.

Moreover, these spiritual beasts were often extremely powerful, and most of them originated from the chaos of the primordial universe.

As time passed, although spiritual beasts could still be born from the natural environment, the difficulty of their birth increased significantly. It often took thousands of years to birth a single spiritual beast.

As a result, spiritual beasts became increasingly rare and their value soared.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention the importance of spiritual beasts to cultivators.

Let me give you an example: Water-based spiritual beasts are essentially collections of water elemental essence.

They only need to ingest a small amount of spiritual stones to continuously emit water elemental energy for a considerable period of time.

Since water elemental energy is highly pure, cultivators practicing water-based techniques can directly absorb this energy to enhance their mana without needing to refine the elemental energy from the environment.

It can be said that water-based spiritual beasts are highly beneficial for the mana growth of water-based cultivators.

Since mana growth is crucial for cultivators, the importance of spiritual beasts to cultivators cannot be overstated.

In other words, spiritual beasts of other elemental types are equally important to cultivators of their respective elements.

Their importance is extremely high.

These days, spiritual beasts are becoming increasingly scarce and yet remain highly important, causing their prices to skyrocket.

Even figures like Sworthy Mountain's Northern Peak or The Six Great Sword of the Northern Peak wouldn't have many spiritual beasts on hand.

As for other ninth-generation elders, many of them probably don't have any spiritual beasts at all.

After all, even Sworthy Mountain, one of the Five Great Immortal Sects of the Great Jin Empire, faces such circumstances.

Now that I've introduced spiritual beasts, let's talk about sealing plates.

Cultivators need spiritual beasts, but it's not always convenient to keep them by their side.

There are concerns about the beasts escaping or being harmed during battles.

That's why, many years ago, a powerful individual created sealing plates, which can seal spiritual beasts within them.

Now, will there be spiritual beasts in the sealing plates among the spoils? Harry couldn't help but feel nervous.

"Merge all things into one, seal all spirits, enter the sealing plate." This is the entry incantation for any sealing plate.

Once the incantation is recited, the spirit will enter the world within the sealing plate.

Of course, Harry had only heard about this during his time at Sworthy Mountain's Northern Peak, so this was his first time trying it out himself.

After reciting the incantation, there was a momentary daze as Harry's spirit entered the world within the sealing plate.

Looking around, he noticed three snow-white rabbits not far from him. Snow-white rabbits?

Harry immediately approached to investigate.

What he found was truly remarkable.

These three snow-white rabbits turned out to be cloud-based, or rather, cloud rabbit, spiritual beasts.

Cloud rabbit spiritual beasts.

Did he see that correctly?

As Harry practiced the Cloud Dragon Heart Technique, cloud-based spiritual beasts were exactly what he needed.

With these three cloud rabbit spiritual beasts, he could continuously receive cloud elemental energy, allowing his mana to grow rapidly.

It was like a godsend. With these three cloud rabbit spiritual beasts, his cultivation speed would greatly accelerate.

This time, he truly struck gold.

He wondered where the Rakshasa obtained these three cloud rabbit spiritual beasts.

Sealing plates were already valuable, but the value of cloud rabbit spiritual beasts far exceeded that of sealing plates.

Little did he know that this Rakshasa had obtained three spiritual beasts through a stroke of luck.

Aware of their immense value, it fled the underground world, hoping to avoid the attention of major sects and cultivators.

Unfortunately, it fell into the hands of Harry, a novice demon slayer.

And Harry, this time, truly hit the jackpot.

The Rakshasa's underground encounter had now translated into a windfall for Harry.

——————

Harry sat cross-legged.

At this point, he had already established a connection with the three cloud rabbit spiritual beasts inside the sealing plate.

Once the connection was established, he felt an endless stream of incredibly pure cloud elemental energy flowing from the sealing plate into his body.

Roughly estimating, with this amount of cloud elemental energy supply, his cultivation speed could basically double.

Doubling his cultivation speed was already quite astonishing, considering how difficult it was for Cultivators to speed up their cultivation.

This significant increase was truly remarkable.

He knew, of course, that this doubling of cultivation speed was only possible because of his current low level of power.

Once his mana increased, the rate at which this amount of elemental energy could enhance his cultivation speed would decrease.

After all, the amount of cloud elemental energy provided by the three cloud rabbit spiritual beasts remained fixed.

At this moment, Harry felt quite exhilarated.

The continuous influx of pure cloud elemental energy from the sealing plate into his body made him feel extremely comfortable.

His mana kept surging, and as he looked at the twenty-two spiritual stones from this loot, he wondered if he should try to break through to the next realm.

After all, he had already reached the peak of the fifth level of the Meditation Phase. It might be worth attempting to break through to the next realm.

He took out all twenty-two spiritual stones, sealed the spiritual energy within them with a sealing array, then crushed all twenty-two low-grade spiritual stones.

Instantly, twenty-two streams of pure spiritual energy overflowed, combined with the cloud elemental energy transmitted from the sealing plate.

The two forces acted together, and Harry felt his mana stirring.

Under the influence of these two forces, he faintly felt that his mana was beginning to change.

The original cloud elemental energy was still present, but now, with the combined effects of the two forces, his mana was condensing and refining continuously.

After a while...

A crisp sound.

This sound didn't come from the outside world but from within his body.

Harry could feel that his mana had undergone a qualitative change in that moment.

This change was thorough, making his mana much stronger and more refined than before.

Harry stretched lazily. Alright, it's time to call it a day.

As he stepped out of the cave, the sun was shining brightly.

Harry's mood was as good as the sunshine, bright and cheerful.