"Thank you for your kindness, Prince Xu, but this young lady has her own hands and feet and doesn't need anyone to escort her... Hmph!" Acting as though she didn't care at all while clearly caring deeply—what on earth is wrong with you, Di Lienze?
Snorting in annoyance, Lan Qinghuan turned on her heel to leave, but stopped at the doorway, turned back, snatched the Soul Breath Grass from the dazed Yemei, shoved four medium-grade spirit stones into her hand, and strode off without looking back.
"Go, protect her in secret!" Despite his conflicting feelings and a sense of unease, Xiye still gave the order to Yemei.
"...Understood!" The "man" made a face behind their king's back. The king was actually sending her to protect him in secret?
Wait, she had referred to herself as "this young lady" just now. Could she really be Lan Qinghuan?
She wasn't mad or foolish? She was faking it!
If so, why?
No matter how many doubts lingered in her heart, Yemei chased after her; she never disobeyed the king's commands.
"What... how is this possible?" Yemei dashed out into the night market. A moment ago, she had been able to track Lan Qinghuan's position steadily, and had even caught sight of her not far ahead.
Yet after turning a few corners and slipping through a couple of alleys, she had completely lost her.
How could this be?
Her tracking and concealment skills were among the best on the Fengxu Continent, or the king would never have made an exception to recruit her.
This eldest miss of the Lan Clan had plenty of secrets!
Well, the monk might run, but the temple couldn't flee; she would go scout out the Lan Estate first, which would give her something to report back to the king.
The Lan Estate was brilliantly lit at the moment, thrown into utter chaos. The head of the household had ordered all the maidservants, pages, and guards to search for the eldest miss. Yawning constantly, they nonetheless had to force themselves awake and search everywhere with meticulous care.
Because the eldest miss's prospective future husband, the Third Prince, was currently raising a huge fuss at the estate with the head of the family.
He was blaming the head of the household for failing to keep a proper eye on their foolish, mad, good-for-nothing eldest miss, complaining that she hadn't even left the family yet and was already staying out all night with complete disregard for shame.
He had no business running over to the Lan Estate in the middle of the night looking for the eldest miss anyway.
Clearly, every word out of his mouth was filled with dissatisfaction toward her, yet unable to find her, he was running around in a frantic frenzy. Not only had he sent his own guards to scour the entire world for her, but even the people of the Lan Estate were dragged into the mess.
Alas, who knew where their mad and foolish eldest miss had run off to hide and play this time?
No one had even seen her leave.
In the dead of night with such heavy dew, where on earth was she hiding?
Everyone in the Lan Estate was busy searching for Lan Qinghuan, and it wasn't as though she was unaware.
She had already gone back, and the moment her spiritual sense opened, she knew exactly what was happening at the estate.
Originally, no one had noticed she was missing. Xi Yun'er had been quite clever this time; upon seeing her note, when her uncle came looking for her, the girl had made up the excuse that she was already asleep and brushed him off.
Yet Feng Jingxuan had to go looking for trouble, coming to find her in the middle of the night, which resulted in the entire household turning upside down in search of her.
With her uncle at home, no one would give Xi Yun'er a hard time. She had no leisure to deal with these troublesome matters right now, so Lan Qinghuan simply found a luxurious inn in the city and checked in.
Few people came to rent rooms at this hour, and the innkeeper was dozing off and not very pleased about being woken up.
However, when Lan Qinghuan tossed out a medium-grade spirit stone and said she was staying for the night and no one was to disturb her, the innkeeper's face melted into sycophancy as he led her to a superior guest room.
Closing the door and making sure the innkeeper had walked away, Lan Qinghuan immediately blew out all the candles and took the Soul Breath Grass from her bosom.
A faint blue glow flickered inside the room. Lan Qinghuan crossed her legs on the clean white bedsheets and turned her spiritual awareness inward.
She saw the brand-new meridians glowing with a lustrous sheen and felt overjoyed, eager to hand the Soul Breath Grass over to her master as soon as possible so they could proceed with her cultivation.
Excitedly, she shouted toward her emerald-green upper Dantian, "Ying, Ying... I've brought you the Soul Breath Grass. Come take it..." No movement. Could he be asleep? That shouldn't be right; didn't he usually rest during the day?
Was it because she wasn't being polite enough?
"Master, Master... Your disciple has brought you the Soul Breath Grass..."
No way, she was being this polite and he still wasn't answering her?
Never mind, it was getting late; she had better drink the Jade Marrow Spirit Liquid quickly and take another dose tomorrow morning. She would be more careful this time and shouldn't take quite so long, right?
Withdrawing from her inner vision, she tucked the Soul Breath Grass back into her bosom, pulled out the precious bottle to drink a single drop of Jade Marrow Spirit Liquid, and dove eagerly into her cultivation routine.
With the experience of her previous attempt, the moment she entered that strange space this time, she went straight into practicing Fetal Breathing Refining Spirit.
"The heart above is Li, which is fire; the kidneys below are Kan, which is water, and the Dantian is like an upside-down furnace and cauldron.
Gaze with the eyes, regulate the breath with the nose, listen with the ears, seal the mouth; outside, be untouched by sights and sounds, inside, be unburdened by thoughts of self..." Her mind transformed intent into threads of silk that coursed through her entire body. Following the fetal breath, a silver web surged into the emerald-green upper Dantian like a myriad of rivers returning to the sea.
"Ah..." A cry of agonizing pain rang out from the Dantian, but Lan Qinghuan, completely lost in her state of selfless cultivation, could not hear it at all as her mind remained in a state of utter clarity.
"As the Buddhist teachings say: Once a single upside-down thought arises, illusory karma instantly is born. Pus and blood constantly converge, and rank, foul odors are everywhere displayed. Skin and flesh are glued to bags of bone; vines bind and tendons wrap around the skeleton. Hair covers the body like wild grass, and insects dwell as close neighbors.
Flesh conceals nothing but foul filth, while external adornments are merely clothes and scarves. The four great elements are inherently unreal, and how could the various roots be true?
Language resounds like the wind, movement follows the breath in cycles. They are forcibly named men and women, while empty titles establish hosts and guests.
A hundred years yield three feet of dirt; ten thousand ages leave a pile of dust.
The noble and the lowly alike look back in vain; the wise and the foolish together choke the spirit.
Vainly born and vainly dying, who is the true original self?" Unconsciously, the Buddhist teachings on impurity that Di Lienze had once taught her echoed in her mind.
The pristine clarity transformed into swirling black mist. Lan Qinghuan saw the separation of human body and soul, and the chilling winds piercing through the scenes of death.
The physical body rotted into slime, gnawed by insects and ants, leaving nothing but bare skeletons exposed. In that instant, she began to rejoice that her mortal body had been destroyed under the Extreme Thunder Dragon Flames of the Nine Heavens Zhuxian Stage.
Wait, if her physical body was destroyed, shouldn't Di Lienze's body have been destroyed as well?
Then who was Xiye? The moment this grave realization hit her, Lan Qinghuan snapped out of the black smoke.
What was going on? Where was this?
Amidst a patch of glowing green light, a nine-tiered pagoda pavilion appeared before her eyes.
Lan Qinghuan stepped forward and shoved hard against the great doors, but put all her strength into it without managing to budge them a single fraction of an inch.
"Is anyone there...?" Habituating herself to calling out, Lan Qinghuan seemed to have forgotten she was still in the middle of cultivation.
"Lan Qinghuan? Good disciple, you can come in... That's wonderful..." Ying was overjoyed. Having heard Lan Qinghuan's cry while he was deep in slumber and healing, his soul power had destabilized and thrown him into chaos. He had tried desperately to calm himself to prevent his fragmented mind and soul from leaking out, but his efforts had yielded little effect. As his soul leaked, it was quickly partially swallowed by the Yuyin Dan.
Suddenly, a wave of fresh spiritual energy poured in, rapidly flooding his mind and soul, nearly bursting his soul apart.
He had thought his dispersed soul power would be entirely consumed by the Yuyin Dan, but it wasn't; the Yuyin Dan had also been surrounded by this spiritual energy.
He had tried gathering his soul back together, never expecting to succeed. Afterward, he discovered that all his injuries were completely healed, and his soul was even more solid than before.
Now, seeing that Lan Qinghuan was also able to enter the Yuyin Dan, he was all the more delighted, because her ability to enter the Yuyin Dan proved that she was already a Space Summoner.