Out of Seclusion

Chen Jinggu was a residence of Xiadu of ancient Fujian.

In her teenage years, she set out for Lüshan to learn skills with her two sworn sisters, Li Sanniang and Lin Jiuniang. When they arrived at Chenmao 1River, they saw no ferry at the berth. An old woman then showed up, offering her shoe to take them across the river.

The shoe was then carried towards them by the river, and grew larger as it approached. The three women went onto the shoe, which sank into the water right away. The old woman turned out to be from Lüshan and had been ordered to point them towards the right direction. The three later made great achievements and established the Lüshan Sect, for which they were worshipped together. Hence the Lüshan Sect's alternative name: Three Ladies Sect.

This was an anecdote found in the ancient records of the sect. However, after some further study carried out by successive abbots of the sect, it turned out that the story was not fictional.

Lüshan was very likely at the bottom of Min River and out of the reach of common people. Only those that had mastered the orthodox teachings of Lüshan, very skillful cultivators, or the very fortunate few were able to see it.

To put it plainly, it was a divine mountain under the water run by Lord Master Xu Xun himself. Hidden in it were various advanced Taoist skills, and to the members of the Lüshan Sect, it was known as the Great Court of Skills of Lüshan.

Every thirty years, when a great ceremony of skill-teaching was carried out, this divine mountain would rise out of the water. Eventually, however, due to some incident, the mountain never came up again since the Ming Dynasty. Hence, a lot of rumors had been going around, such as the saying that the thirty years had turned into three thousand years.

Judging from what had been happening, Lord Master probably deemed the draining of the spiritual essence irreversible and closed off the court for good.

Huang Huiguang briefly explained this secret of his sect to Shi Yunlai. It was the first time the latter had heard about it, who stood there dazed for a minute.

Being a remote sect with a strangely malicious way of doing things, Lüshan had always been the odd one within the Taoist community. Huang Huiguang himself did not stand out in the monastery, either. No one had anticipated that he was the keeper of such a big secret.

Calming down his mind, Shi Yunlai asked, "Junior Brother, does this secret have something to do with that ancient sword?"

"To tell you the truth, Senior Brother, ancestors of my sect had been combing through the clues on the Great Court of Skill of Lüshan for generations. We were able to reach a conclusion with much certainty when my master was in office. Lord Master himself was in charge of the great court, and only through his exceptional ability was Lüshan about to rise out of the water.

"Although the spiritual essence has recovered now, Lord Master himself must have passed away centuries ago, leaving the court unattended. It only occurred to me just then when I saw that sword. According to a forefather of the Qing Dynasty, maybe Lüshan could be activated by carrying out a sacrifice ceremony with a refined instrument with water attribute."

"Well…" Shi Yunlai frowned at those words. After some consideration, he asked, "How certain are you about this?"

"Not in the least, but I think we can have a go. I'll bet you anything that those people cannot fight that temptation!" Huang Huiguang was as tough a guy as his appearance suggested.

Shi Yunlai was no less resolute himself. After another moment of pondering, he said, "All right. Let's go have another talk with them."

***

Capital city, an office.

The old man finished listening to the report, and the first thought came to his mind was how unreliable this information sounded. He asked, "How much truth was in that Huang Huiguang's story?"

"Um, he knew the rough direction of Lüshan and had a general idea of the sacrifice ceremony."

"General idea? Where did he get the courage to talk to us with all these guesses?"

"Sir, it was just a proposal. Didn't they ask for our decision?" said his assistant.

"Humph! They were unhappy to see us take the sword. That's what that was all about—they're trying to give us a hard time." The old man had apparently seen right through them. However, just as Huang Huiguang predicted, the government indeed could not resist the temptation of an immortal dwelling. After a little pause, the old man asked, "Where are we on that sword?"

"That sword flew to Gutian when Fish Mountain collapsed, and stayed unnoticed for a while. About a month ago, a high school student named Wu You found it. The sword is only for those with innate state and above, and common people will lose their mind using it. Wu You is hospitalized for his recovery. According to the monastery, the Youxian Sect had seven sword manuals and seven swords in total. Only four manuals were discovered so far and one is missing. There are two swords now, and based on the characteristic of this one, it should be the Black Water Sword of Concealment." The assistant sounded excited, apparently very interested in this particular sword. "We don't know about its major ability yet. The basic move we've been able to make with it confirmed that it could vanish into the air and make undetectable ambush.

"As for the scientific tests we ran, um… it's hard and sharp. That's it!"

"How about the material it was made from?"

"We could only analyze the physical and chemical parameters, but nothing else beyond that."

'Tsk!' The old man sighed, feeling frustrated. "Do you think there are more sword manuals in that third pool of Fish Mountain?"

"Sir, you're asking me a question I couldn't possibly answer. Only Mr. Gu can go into the pool now, and how are we supposed to know what's inside if he doesn't want to go? But Priest Lu has said he would be able to do it in two or three years."

"Two or three years? How can we afford to wait that long?"

That made the old man even more worried. Since the international conference, all the countries were putting all their effort in developing their transcendental powers—especially Europe. Most of their countries had been making concerted efforts and helping each other out.

The western magic and alchemy had great advancements in the fundamental subjects. The magic spots used in Bonn, for instance, had been expanded to many areas with the full cooperation of several major countries. With the constant establishment of various official organizations, there was now a great upsurge among the general population.

But that was not applicable in this country. The enormous population and vast land area only meant there were more problems that needed solving. The country was almost running at its full capacity with the construction of new urban agglomerations and the migration tasks alone.

It was no longer a competition on the top-level combat ability, for the world had long reached the conclusion on that: we knew you had that man, all right? We bowed to you for that! What every country was competing over now was the building of the fundations and the development in the lower to mid-level, which was much more difficult.

The choice for the government was rather straightforward now. They could either keep the ancient sword, hoping for the missing sword manual that could have already been lost to show up someday, or they could take the risk to try that Lüshan, which might destroy the ancient sword, but they could obtain a great amount of heritage from ancient cultivators.

One sword manual vs many Taoist skills.

After a lengthy consideration, he still thought they should play it safe. "Take some people over there to have a look first. I will add it to the meeting agenda and try to reach a decision as soon as possible."

"Yes!"

***

Gurgle!

The air in the meditation room stirred all of a sudden. There was a stillness for a brief moment, then the movement in the air became even livelier.

It was moving at a frequency beyond the perception of common people. In Gu Yu's eyes, though, the air around him seemed to be bubbling up. With the constant forming and bursting of the bubbles, vapor was extracted from the air and soon gathered in one spot.

The spot was rapidly becoming damp and cold, which turned the vapor into countless tiny ice crystals as a small cloud was formed.

Gu Yu kept this technique running. More vapor was gathered, and the icy crystal became heavier… finally, about two minutes after he activated this technique, it began to rain from that cloud.

The rain was not heavy, but was falling gently over an area about one m^2 in area. The raindrops fell onto the rush mat, making a faint tapping sound.

"..."

Watching the fine rain falling inside the room, Gu Yu's eyes were filled with wonder and joy. It seemed forever before he finally deactivated the technique. The rain then stopped, and the cloud dissipated.

He then activated the Small Moving Technique and the water disappeared from the floor, reappearing in his hand in the form of a water ball. Playing with it with his eyes closed, Gu Yu went over the process in his head.

It looked as if he was manipulating water molecules directly to form them into the cloud and rain, but that was not actually the case, for all Taoist skills were essentially applications of Qi.

Therefore, the Small Cloud & Rain Technique was also an application of water-attributed spiritual essence.

What had vexed him before was his inability to transform the spiritual essence of the five elements to the actual materials. This technique, however, worked like a converter that could transform water-attributed spiritual essence into water.

This converting process was exactly what he needed!

Gu Yu activated the Small Moving Technique again, and the ball of water splashed under the gourd vine outside his window. He then sat down with his eyes closed, going through the details of the technique carefully.

Being a Human Immortal, once he mastered a skill, he would be able to comprehend all related skills perfectly. When he opened his eyes again, another twenty days had passed…

The saying that "one did not feel the passage of time deep in the mountains" was a feeling that he had some experience with before, but it was only after he reached the Human Immortal state that he truly understood its essence. One could not blame the cultivators for their detached manner. Worldly affairs were evanescent to them, and most of the people and things were but motes in their eyes that they saw lighter than the wind and paler than the cloud.

Outside, April had arrived. Apart from the Northeast and certain areas of the Northwest, warmth had returned to the vast country once more. In some areas in the South, the temperature had already become abnormal, and was going to repeat that oven mode once more.

Pale smoke was coiling in the air in the meditation room. Gu Yu finally opened his eyes.

His face was as motionless as a windless pool as he grabbed at the air. Whoosh! A ball of fire popped into life over his palm. It was not the fire-attributed spiritual essence, but an actual ball of fire.

Immediately after that, the fireball was stretched into the shape of a spear, then into a running animal, and a flying bird after that. The changes of the shape seemed effortless.

In a moment, the flame dissipated; he made a wave, at which a branch of the big tree outside his window grew rapidly, soon climbing in. This time, it was not a transformation, but rapid growth activated by wood-attributed spiritual essence.

After that, he pressed down at the empty air and half of the ground in the room split open as if a switch had been turned on, revealing a dark pit beneath. It then closed up with a thud.

Only then did Gu Yu finally smile and rise to his feet. He then pushed the door open and walked out.

The sun was shining brightly outside; the air was filled with the fragrance of flowers and the chirping of birds. He was dazed for a second by this scene, as if it was of another world. Standing in the courtyard and looking around, he saw a 174 cm little girl meditating under the old tree.

Her little face was peaceful, at ease, and somehow more delicate and pleasant than before.

After watching her for a moment, he grabbed casually at the air, seemingly catching a streak of breeze between his fingers, and threw it out forcibly.

Whoosh!

The breeze seemed to have turned into a streak of sword energy that came with a layer of pale golden color, making it even sharper. The golden beam shot right out of his palm and reached Long Qiu in the blink of an eye.

"Awww… awww…"

All of a sudden, a chubby kid popped out of thin air with its mouth wide open, naively trying to swallow the golden beam. However, as it reached its lips, the sharpness frightened it greatly and the kid disappeared right away, leaving the path towards its master unguarded.

Whoosh!

Just then, a streak of blue light flew out of Long Qiu's body, so fast that it seemed to break the limit of speed itself. It was as if everything had turned into slow motion in comparison.

Bang!

The blue light shattered the golden beam, circled in the air, and flew back into Long Qiu's body.

"Brother!" Long Qiu's eyes shot open, and she ran happily to him right away. "Brother! You've finished your seclusion?"

"Yes. I have made some achievements in these four months. Where is everyone?"

"Jin Jin is supervising the construction site, and Sister is supervising her." Long Qiu took his arm naturally and swayed it around. "What did you learn? Tell me, tell me."

"Some simple five-element Taoist skills and a formation skill."

"A formation skill?"

Even in surprise, Xiao Qiu's head was still turning quickly. She thought about Phoenix Mountain right away, and asked immediately, "Are you saying... are you saying we're going to have our own great protective formation for the mountain?"