A few days later, two flight lights arose on Clear Spring Peak. After idling for a bit, the white light crossed Mount Taikang and disappeared into the sky, leaving the red one to remain in midair and remain stationary for a long time.

After a long while, Qin Xi gently sighed. He looked at the sky, waved his sleeves, and landed back on the ground.

Now that Tiange had left, he should continue his Closed Door Meditation.

He understood very clearly that as a cultivator, this kind of separation was normal for them. So, he just suppressed the faint reluctance in his heart and returned to the cave quietly.

“Master.” Ye Zhenji came to welcome him.

Qin Xi smiled. “Go work on your own cultivation. Your aunt has left, and you should be more hardworking, you know?”

“En.” Ye Zhenji revealed a smile. “Master, rest assured. I’m not a kid and I understand all this.”

Qin Xi was stunned and thought about Ye Zhenji’s performance in the past three years, he also smiled. “Right. After all, you’ve experienced some things, and you’ve changed now.”

He put his hands behind his back, went into his Closed Room and said, “I won’t leave for the next ten years, so I’ll leave the cave to you. If there’s nothing urgent, don’t disturb me.”

“I understand, Master.”

Mo Tiange took her time to continue with her journey. After half a month, she appeared in Linhai again.

This time, she had a purpose, so she merely greeted Wei Haolan then followed the now-familiar route to the sea.

Once in the sea, Xiaofan became excited and thrashed in the sea happily. Although there was water in the Virtual Sky World, the stream wasn’t the sea, after all. Xiaofan had lived in the sea since childhood.

Mo Tiange smiled at it as it swam round and round. Finally, Xiaofan came back to her side, raised its head and said, “Master, where are we going?”

“Go to the place your grandfather once mentioned,” Mo Tiange answered. “But since you don’t know much about this place, come back and I’ll fly together with you.”

“No need.” Xiaofan flicked its tail and jumped from the water flexibly, drawing a beautiful arc. “Here in the sea, us Sea Dragons can sense the taste of the sea and won’t get lost.”

“Huh?” Mo Tiange was a little stunned. “But you’ve never been there, and it’s so far from where you lived. Can you still swim back?”

“En.” Xiaofan nodded earnestly. “Master, rest assured—I have the Sea Dragons’ instinct.” As it spoke, Xiaofan looked at Mo Tiange piteously. “Master, want to sit on me? I’ll carry you to the destination? I want to swim…”

Faced with such pleading eyes, what else could Mo Tiange say? She looked down to see that Xiaofan’s injuries had healed, and its tail was strong and flexible. Its wagging just now could perhaps break a stone, so it wouldn’t have any issues with her sitting on its back.

“Fine, but just tell me if you’re tired.”

“En.” Xiaofan jumped up joyfully. “Pa!” It fell back into the water and said hurriedly, “Master, come on, let’s hurry and go.”

Seeing that it couldn’t wait around much longer, Mo Tiange smiled and applied a simple Art of Avoiding Water to herself then sat on Xiaofan’s back, allowing it to lead the way.

Xiaofan’s body was more than ten feet long. Its tail was flexible and its fins were powerful. It was like an arrow off the string in the sea, and although it wasn’t as fast as her flight light, it wasn’t much slower.

In the beginning, Mo Tiange kept comparing the map she had corrected herself to see if Xiaofan was heading in the right direction. Later on, when she realized that Xiaofan did, in fact, have an accurate sense of direction in the sea, Mo Tiange stopped worrying. She then used her time on Xiaofan’s back to study Mo Yaoqing’s cultivation notes.

A human and a beast swam to the depths of the Eastern Sea in this leisurely fashion.

On the offshore, there were only a few low-ranking sea beasts who saw the fifth-rank Xiaofan and naturally didn’t dare to come forward. As they went deeper and deeper into the Eastern Sea, although high-ranking sea beasts appeared occasionally, because of Mo Tiange’s powerful momentum, they also didn’t dare to approach them. After all, a sixth-rank human and a fifth-rank Sea Dragon weren’t easy for ordinary sea beasts to take on.

It wasn’t until two months had passed that Mo Tiange felt some pressure from seventh-rank sea beasts, so she returned Xiaofan to her Spiritual Beast Bag reluctantly and gathered clouds under her feet, stepping into her Cloud-Treading Boots and flying high.

The deeper she went, the higher the rank of the sea beasts she encountered. She had a clear purpose this time, so it was better to avoid those sea beasts.

After she waited for the breath of the seventh-rank sea beasts to disappear, Mo Tiange released Xiaofan and asked, “Xiaofan, can you direct the way when you’re not in the sea?”

Xiaofan floated in midair and nodded. “Yes, but I’ll be a bit slower.”

“En, that’s okay.” It didn’t matter if they were slowed down a bit; the most important thing was safety. If she still allowed Xiaofan to swim in the sea, her human cultivator breath would probably disturb high-ranking demonic beasts, and fierce fighting might ensue. But as long as they flew high enough in the air, those demonic beasts couldn’t sense their presence accurately, so they generally wouldn’t act rashly.

This boring journey lasted for four months. The Old Sea Dragon said it would take about a month, but that was Mo Yaoqing’s speed. When Mo Yaoqing reached the Celestial Pole, she was already a Nascent Soul cultivator whose speed was much faster than Mo Tiange, even if she travelled at a leisurely pace.

After four months, after seeing more and more high-ranking sea beasts appear, Mo Tiange finally found the big island that had a volcano. She breathed a sigh of relief. If she still couldn’t find it, she would have to consider turning back. There were quite a few seventh-rank sea beasts there; who knew when an eighth-rank sea beast might appear? It might be dangerous for them by then.

“Master, there it is.” Xiaofan’s voice rang out in her head.

Mo Tiange looked down and saw that the big island was hundreds of miles in circumference, more than ten times the size of the island Mo Yaoqing lived on, and its topography was completely different.

The island was filled with mountainous stones, ravines, sandstones, and only a small amount of soil, so plants were quite rare. Most importantly, there was no sign of spiritual aura on the island, so there weren’t any demonic beasts nearby.

This was good news for Mo Tiange. The island didn’t have spirit veins, so it wouldn’t attract demonic beasts. She didn’t need to face any unknown demonic beasts.

In the middle of the island, there was a cold, rising volcano without any sign of recent eruptions. Mo Tiange flew to the top of the volcano and looked down, only to see the blackness inside and couldn’t see anything else clearly. She swept over with her divine sense and saw no danger, so she slowly touched down.

As she descended lower, Mo Tiange was gradually able to see the interior of the volcano. There was no lava and no heat—just cold volcanic walls. It was too dark to see clearly inside.

Mo Tiange spread out her hand and light gathered in her palm then the Heaven and Earth Fan appeared in her hand. The fan pendant sent out a faint, white light.

When she explored Mo Yaoqing’s cave last time, she needed to take out the Mother of Moonstones each time to illuminate everything, which was very inconvenient. So, she simply polished the moonstone into a fan pendant and hung it on the Heaven and Earth Fan. This made it much more convenient to hold in her hand.

“Grandpa said there was water down there, so let me get down first,” Xiaofan said, as he landed behind her.

Mo Tiange paused and nodded. “Good.”

Not long after Xiaofan went down, Mo Tiange surely heard water noises then Xiaofan’s voice rang out: “Master, come down. The water isn’t very deep.”

Mo Tiange held the Heaven and Earth Fan and landed at the bottom of the volcano carefully, looked around, and felt a little confused. “Is there a road here?”

There were shallow streams at the bottom of the volcano, but she didn’t see any roads nearby.

“The path is down in the water,” Xiaofan said. “Master, come and sit on my back.”

After thinking for a short time, Mo Tiange applied an Art of Avoiding Water then sat on Xiaofan’s back. Xiaofan flicked its tail and dove to the bottom suddenly.

The Mother of Moonstones gave out faint light, only illuminating the narrow space surrounding them. Mo Tiange spread her divine sense and surely discovered a channel in the water, yet she didn’t know where it led.

As soon as Xiaofan entered the water, it was so vigorous that it swam for a while and sped up. Mo Tiange felt it was diving deeper and deeper, and her Art of Avoiding Water was also receiving more and more pressure on its spiritual aura shield.

Of course, now that she was a Core Formation cultivator, the pressure under water was nothing to her, but she was just a little confused. Water was flowing downhill and Xiaofan was diving into the water—could this be a waterway? According to Mo Yaoqing’s records on the jade slip, it took her a long time to come to the Celestial Pole. Did she spend several months in the water?

Fortunately, she didn’t have those doubts for too long. After swimming for about half a day, Xiaofan began to float upward.

Its speed was increasing when suddenly, there was a “Crash”, and a beast and human broke out of the water.

Countless water droplets dripped from the spiritual aura shield. Mo Tiange waved her hand, withdrew the Art of Avoiding Water and spread out her divine sense.

It was an underground river, winding its way to a point so far away that her divine sense couldn’t feel it. The surrounding rock walls were completely irregular in shape.

Xiaofan carried her and swam forward slowly. The water was so cold that even Xiaofan, a demonic beast, felt very uncomfortable.

“Xiaofan, how about you just fly with me?”

Xiaofan shook its head and refused. “No need, Master. I like the feeling of swimming in the water.”

“But the water…”

“It’s okay.” Xiaofan wagged its tail and instantly a layer of blue aura floated on its scales, wrapping its whole body. “Then it won’t be uncomfortable.”

Mo Tiange took a closer look at it and found it was also a kind of protective spiritual aura, so she nodded. “Fine.”

Mo Tiange didn’t know how long they had been traveling in the dark river. What accompanied them was only the noisy sound of water and the sound of Xiaofan swimming. She held her Heaven and Earth Fan and spread her divine sense the whole time.

This riverway had no spirit veins, so even though there were fish in the water, they were just ordinary fish, not daring to approach her and Xiaofan.

A few days later, Mo Tiange frowned and sensed some spiritual aura.

Then Xiaofan stopped. “Master, there are spirit veins ahead.”

“En.” Mo Tiange paid attention to them with her divine sense for a while then said, “There are no living beings there; just go ahead.”

Xiaofan responded and continued to swim forward.

The spiritual aura became more and more thick, and Mo Tiange looked around the rock walls and found it was a spirit stone mine. However, the quality and grade of the spirit stones weren’t very high. It just looked like a small vein.

They passed through the middle of the spirit stone mine. Mo Tiange had sharp eyes and found something that seemed to be growing on a certain spirit stone, so she hurriedly said, “Wait.”

Xiaofan stopped. “What’s wrong?”

Mo Tiange carefully dug a piece of jade shining with a white light from the rock wall and carefully observed it.

“Spiritual Aura-Gathering Stone?” Looking at the jade stone in her hand, Mo Tiange was surprised. “It’s a Spiritual Aura-Gathering Stone!”

Upon hearing this, Xiaofan was very curious. “Master, what’s a Spiritual Aura-Gathering Stone?”

After confirming that the object in her hand was a Spiritual Aura-Gathering Stone, Mo Tiange put it into her Qiankun Bag and said, ” A Spiritual Aura-Gathering Stone is a type of jade stone that occasionally appears in spirit stone mines. It looks similar to spirit stones, but it has the effect of making spiritual aura extremely concentrated. In the process of pill and tool refining, the most difficult part is figuring out how to concentrate spiritual aura and seal it in medicinal pills and magic weapons. But with a Spiritual Aura-Gathering Stone, it can improve the success rate of refining.”

“Oh…” Demonic beasts didn’t understand pill or tool refining, so Xiaofan just responded conveniently, half understanding and half not.

Mo Tiange didn’t expect that a Spiritual Aura-Gathering Stone would appear in this small mine, but it was a surprise, so she ordered, “Xiaofan, swim a few laps more in the vicinity. We’ll search to see if there’s any more.”