Chapter 266

Chapter 266: I Am Willing to Offer the Sect Treasure to Senior
Lin Shuang gave a bitter smile. “Senior Yu, within a hundred miles of Dragon Pool Mountains, it is all demonic beast territory. If I leave alone right now, in less than a quarter of an hour I will fall into another demonic beast’s hands.”

Lin Shuang did not want Yu Zhao to think she was greedy for life, afraid of death, and pushing her luck, but she really did not have the strength to cross Dragon Pool Mountains.

She had just escaped death with great difficulty. She truly did not want to push herself back into danger again for the sake of a sliver of pride.

She also could not shamelessly beg Yu Zhao to protect her, so she could only choose to tell the truth.

Yu Zhao fell silent.

What Lin Shuang said was not an exaggeration.

Dragon Pool Mountains had been occupied by demonic beasts from all sides. Even when she was moving around inside while pretending to be a fox demon, she was always on guard and did not dare relax.

But Yu Zhao also did not want to bring along such an obvious target that might expose her identity.

Her task this time was to safely bring the little foxes back. She did not want any extra trouble.

Thinking of her junior brothers and junior sisters who were still wandering outside with nowhere to stay, Lin Shuang gritted her teeth and said, “Senior Yu, I am willing to offer the sect treasure to Senior. I only ask Senior to protect me down the mountain and let me keep my life.”

“Sect treasure?”

Yu Zhao remembered that Lin Shuang came from a declining little sect. The whole sect only had seven people. Among the disciples, she ranked first and was the First Senior Sister.

Counting her, the entire sect only had two Golden Core cultivators. The other one was her master, who was also the sect master.

Could such a bottom-tier sect even have a sect treasure?

Even if it did, would Lin Shuang’s master really be willing to use the sect treasure to trade for Lin Shuang’s life?

Seeing Yu Zhao’s doubt, Lin Shuang spilled everything about her sect.

The Hunyuan Sect, where she came from, looked poor and shabby on the surface, but behind the scenes, it was rich to the point of overflowing.

Because no one would think that beneath a broken, rundown sect there was a mid-grade spirit vein buried.

The spirit vein was not very large, but the spirit stones it produced were stable in quality.

Hunyuan Sect did not have many disciples. The spirit stones from the vein were more than enough for the disciples to use.

Lin Shuang’s master believed in getting rich quietly and never allowed the disciples to talk about it outside. Outsiders had no idea about Hunyuan Sect’s situation.

At first, Yu Zhao even thought the “sect treasure” Lin Shuang mentioned was that mid-grade spirit vein. But the more she listened, the more solemn her expression became.

The accident happened while Lin Shuang was away attending the sect grand tournament. Someone somehow found out about the spirit vein and, in a single night, sucked all the spiritual energy out of the entire vein.

The next day, when Lin Shuang’s master noticed something was wrong and went to check, he was killed with a single palm strike, not even leaving behind a last word.

Lin Shuang’s junior brothers and junior sisters had no idea what to do. They did not dare stay in the sect any longer and could only look for other places to hide.

By the time Lin Shuang got back, what she saw was her master’s corpse, her panicked junior brothers and junior sisters, and a dead spirit vein.

“It is one thing for him to drain the spirit vein’s spirit power, but why did he have to take my master’s life! And before he left, he even destroyed the most important spirit core!” Lin Shuang’s eyes were full of hatred.

The most important part of a spirit vein was the spirit core.

As long as the spirit core was still there, even if the spirit stones were mined out, more would slowly grow again later.

That was why the sects and sect masters of the cultivation world all racked their brains to search for spirit veins.

As long as you had a spirit vein, you had a steady, endless supply of spirit stones.

Cultivators in the cultivation world were not fools. They all understood that draining the pond to catch the fish was not a long-term plan.

After discovering a spirit vein, they would only focus on mining spirit stones. They would never touch the spirit core.

Why would the person who killed Lin Shuang’s master do such a foolish thing as killing the chicken to get the eggs?

Was it just to vent anger?

Or did he have some other purpose…

Wait.

Yu Zhao’s brow twitched.

She suddenly remembered that in her previous life, after she was expelled from the Five Elements Dao Sect and everyone in the cultivation world was shouting to beat and kill her, she had also heard of similar incidents.

Several sects that had grown strong because of their spirit veins ended up losing their spirit veins. One after another, they announced they were disbanding.

At that time her reputation in the cultivation world stank to high heaven. Someone took the lead and directly dumped the blame on her, saying she was resentful of the world, that she snuck into those sects and ruined their spirit veins.

Many cultivators who had fallen from sect disciples to rogue cultivators believed it and joined the hunt for her, shouting that they would avenge their sects.

So actually, long before that, someone had already been secretly draining the cultivation world’s spirit veins and destroying them. It was just that the locations of spirit veins were usually hidden, so the news did not spread widely.

Yu Zhao smelled something unusual.

After finishing the story of what had happened recently, Lin Shuang finally got to the main point. “Before I set out, Master passed the sect treasure to me. I can decide to give it to Senior Yu.”

“What sect treasure are you talking about?”

“It is the key to open the Ancient Dao Arena.”

“The Ancient Dao Arena!” Yu Zhao’s pupils shrank, and her heart skipped a beat.

The Ancient Dao Arena had been built in ancient times by the power of many immortals as a place specially used to preach and teach.

Every year, at a set time, Grand Adepts would give lectures in the Ancient Dao Arena. All cultivators could go listen. If they were lucky, they might even get direct guidance from a Grand Adept.

Later, as the spiritual energy of the cultivation world grew thinner and thinner and the orthodox lineages could no longer continue, the Ancient Dao Arena vanished overnight.

Yu Zhao never thought she would hear about the Ancient Dao Arena again from Lin Shuang.

“Since you have the key to open the Ancient Dao Arena, why not go there yourself?”

Even if there were no more Grand Adepts teaching on the Ancient Dao Arena now, there would definitely be traces left behind by them. Behind a single inconspicuous carved pattern might be a flash of enlightenment a Grand Adept once had.

For a cultivator, that was invisible wealth.

Lin Shuang’s talent was not bad. If she could enter the Ancient Dao Arena and leave safely, her cultivation level might not visibly rise in the short term, but it would definitely have a deep impact on her future.

There was no way Lin Shuang had not thought of this.

“Senior Yu, to be honest, I only have the key to the Ancient Dao Arena. But as for the exact location of the Ancient Dao Arena and the method to open it, I know nothing.” Lin Shuang spoke with guilt.

As a cultivator with ambition, how could she not want to enter the legendary sacred land of cultivation?

She had the key to a mountain of treasure but could not enter it.

Otherwise, the key to the Ancient Dao Arena would not have been passed down from her master to her.

Yu Zhao understood.

The key to the Ancient Dao Arena was the final threshold to enter the Martial Dao Arena.

But Lin Shuang had not even stepped over the threshold to enter the Ancient Dao Arena itself. How could she ever have the chance to use the key?

“Then how can you be sure the thing in your hand is really the key to the Ancient Dao Arena?”

“Senior Yu will know with one look.”

Lin Shuang turned around, facing away from Yu Zhao, lifted her sleeve, and drew her index finger across her arm.

Her flesh split open, and a jade pendant the length of a forefinger fell into her palm.

She quickly wrapped the wound with her spirit power, then wiped the blood off the jade pendant. Only then did she turn back around and offer the jade pendant to Yu Zhao.

Yu Zhao did not take it right away. Her gaze fell on the jade pendant, inspecting it inch by inch.

The milky-white jade pendant, tinged faintly with yellow, had a warm, smooth texture. An ancient aura rushed out toward her.

In a daze, Yu Zhao seemed to hear tens of thousands of voices chanting. In front of her eyes, figures of countless cultivators sitting cross-legged in a plaza flashed by in quick succession.

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