Chapter 6: Cultivation Academy

The Starry Sky Forest is located to the south of the Tian Dou Empire, spanning across two major empires, and it is one of the gathering places for the three major wild spirit beasts.

People dare only build cities around its periphery, and only Soul Masters venture inside to search for the soul rings they need.

However, at the core of the Starry Sky Forest, inside a giant tree, there are traces of human habitation.

Strangely enough, from the outside, the giant tree appears intact, without any signs of damage.

But if someone possessed the ability to see through illusions, they would discover a door at the bottom of this giant tree with a diameter of over ten meters, engraved with the words "Cultivation Academy." Looking closely, they would find that at every few meters upward, a window appears on the wooden door.

Calculating it, the entire tree has eight windows and one wooden door, in other words, someone lives inside the tree and has built a nine-story building.

It's because of the illusion that envelops the entire tree that it remains hidden from the soul beasts roaming outside the Starry Sky Forest.

Suddenly, a figure darted out from among the treetops.

This person was none other than Bai Yuan.

After carefully surveying the surroundings and ensuring there was no danger, he cautiously approached the giant tree and merged into the illusion, "disappearing" within.

Pushing open the door, Bai Yuan was greeted with a living room.

The living room wasn't big, with a wooden round table in the center surrounded by wooden stools. They were all carved together with the wooden floor when the tree was hollowed out.

Bai Yuan ascended the wooden stairs integrated into the wall and arrived on the second floor, which was a wooden kitchen with a burning fire. But due to regular use of spells, there was no risk of setting the whole tree on fire.

Bai Yuan continued up the stairs. On the third floor, there was a single-person bedroom with only a simple wooden bed.

The fourth, fifth, and the following six or seven floors were all similar in style, extremely rudimentary.

However, once he stepped into the seventh floor, the world changed drastically. Despite still being within the tree, upon going upstairs, Bai Yuan found himself in a lake hundreds of meters in diameter.

The water in the lake was incredibly clear, but strangely, its bottom was invisible, and there were no other living creatures in the lake except for a blue lotus at its center.

"Master, you're back."

The blue lotus transformed into a little girl with white hair, rushing into Bai Yuan's embrace. The lake around them dissipated like bubbles, transforming into the same rudimentary room as below.

Bai Yuan caught White Rain in his arms and lovingly patted her head. "White Rain, have you been practicing diligently recently?"

White Rain looked up and smiled. "Of course, I've been practicing diligently. I've reached the ninth level of Qi cultivation. But on another note, what about the disciples you promised to bring back for me? Why don't I sense their presence? Did you hide them somewhere?"

White Rain leaned on Bai Yuan's shoulder, looking down below but sensing and seeing nothing.

Bai Yuan smiled awkwardly and said, "White Rain, I didn't get any disciples this time, no one believes me."

Bai Yuan let out a sigh. He didn't know what to say. Even though he performed his spells in front of ordinary people, they still considered him a Soul Master who hid his soul rings using special methods. So no one believed him and wanted to be his disciple.

Those without innate soul power called him a fraud and refused to become his disciples. Those with innate soul power thought he was insane, a Soul Master claiming to be a cultivator, and they also refused to become his disciples.

White Rain hugged Bai Yuan's neck and comforted him, saying, "Master, it's their loss if they don't want to become your disciples. We don't need to bother with them."

Bai Yuan hugged White Rain and looked back at the rooms downstairs, feeling somewhat depressed.

Six years ago, Bai Yuan came to the Starry Sky Forest with White Rain to escape the search of the Spirit Hall and Tang Hao. Inside this tree, he painstakingly created eight rooms.

He thought he would quickly find new disciples to fill these rooms, but eight years later, it was still just the two of them here.

During these six years, Bai Yuan's appearance had remained almost unchanged, likely due to his cultivation. As for White Rain, she was even more exceptional, showing no signs of growing up.

It was as if, after a beast transformed into a human, it would be forever fixed in its human appearance, or perhaps the longevity of beasts was too long, and six years were not enough for her to grow up even a little.

This left Bai Yuan speechless. She used to be such a cool senior disciple, but because of his mistakes, she had become a forever young little girl.

As for White Rain's cultivation in the past six years, she had only advanced six levels, compared to the three levels she gained in one night.

The reason behind the slower progress was the usual trend of slower cultivation as one reached higher levels. Additionally, that night, White Rain had transformed the hundreds of years of beast strength in her body into her own cultivation, resulting in such rapid progress.

Now, after six years, with the help of the Formation Pill's effects, she could only advance six levels. It was because only at the Golden Core stage would a demon beast be able to transform into a human form, so transforming earlier was equivalent to enjoying the benefits of the Golden Core stage in advance.

Seeing Bai Yuan fall into silence, White Rain suddenly said, "Master, since those humans don't appreciate you, why not take a few demon beasts as your disciples?"

Bai Yuan fell silent.

Taking demon beasts as disciples was something he had considered.

But at the moment, he didn't have enough Master Virtue Points, and the price of Formation Pills in the market was 10,000 Master Virtue Points!

After six years of completing system missions, Bai Yuan had only just acquired over 12,300 Master Virtue Points.

If he exchanged them for Formation Pills, it would be a distant dream to exchange for the cultivation technique he desired.

"Master, why don't you take a demon beast as a disciple? If you can't communicate with them, I can do it for you. Or you can take this big tree as your disciple; it has been wanting to become your disciple for a long time," White Rain said playfully, leaning against Bai Yuan's chest.

Bai Yuan hesitated for a moment and asked, "You mean, your big tree sister wants to be my disciple?"

White Rain nodded and said, "Yes, it really wants to be your disciple. Every day after you left, it asked me when you would come back and if it could become your disciple."

Bai Yuan was slightly stunned. He had searched high and low in the human world, but nobody wanted to become his disciple. Yet White Rain had a big tree sister that wished to be his disciple and longed for it every day.

"Where is this big tree sister you're talking about?"

White Rain replied, "We are inside the body of the big tree sister."

Bai Yuan: ...

"I practically hollowed it out inside; doesn't

it resent me?" Bai Yuan asked.

White Rain was taken aback and said, "Master, let me ask."

Bai Yuan fell into contemplation.

A few seconds later, White Rain said, "The big tree sister said it used to hate us and wanted to kill us at first, but after I awakened its spiritual wisdom, it didn't hate us that much anymore. It said it wants a chance for you to be its Master."

Bai Yuan still didn't answer.

He was worried that the tree was lying.

He opened the attribute panel.

[Host: Bai Yuan]

[Cultivation: Ninth Level of Qi Cultivation]

[Items: Foundation Pill Formula]

[Special Abilities: Junior Alchemist, Junior Artifact Craftsman, Junior Array Master, Junior Talisman Master]

[Number of Disciples: 1]

[Bound Disciples: White Rain (Current Binding Limit: 1) (After binding a disciple, the host's cultivation will increase by the same level every time the disciple advances)]

[Master Virtue Points: 12,300]

[Shop: Click to open]

[Current Task 1: Refine Foundation Pill, Reward: Intermediate Alchemist, 1,000 Master Virtue Points]

[Current Task 2: Accept three disciples (1 disciple already accepted), Reward: Current Most Desired Treasure Chest, 3,000 Master Virtue Points]

[Current Task 3: Break through the Foundation Establishment stage, Reward: Doubling the binding limit for disciples, 10,000 Master Virtue Points]