Daily life of a cultivation judge

Chapter 1490: Unexpected sight (1)

Yang Qing smiled, turning around to meet the speaker. He had already recognized the voice and the presence as they walked over.

"It really is," said Yang Qing. "Nice to meet you, Appraiser Chen Yu," Yang Qing said to the blue-haired newcomer from Jade Leaf Academy, who walked over and stood by his side.

"So it was you," Chen Yu said, smiling, an appraising glint flashing in his eyes as he examined Yang Qing. "The mysterious figure who traded that Green Flame Tree Sap."

Chen Yu’s intrigue showed plainly as he made the comment.

"Yang Qing, of the Order," Yang Qing said, cupping his fist at Chen Yu.

"Chen Yu of Jade Leaf Academy," said Chen Yu, returning the greeting.

"From the Order," Chen Yu said, as the two of them turned to face the setting sun, its rays spilling across the horizon.

"That explains the sap," Chen Yu commented. "I didn’t think I’d meet someone from the Order here."

"I didn’t think I’d meet someone from Jade Leaf Academy here either," Yang Qing said leisurely.

"Life and its never-ending surprises," Chen Yu said wistfully.

"Mmh," Yang Qing nodded.

A short silence passed before Chen Yu broke it. "You’re heading back? To the Order, I mean?"

"Yes," said Yang Qing. "What about you? Headed back to the Academy?"

Chen Yu shook his head. "No," he said. "I am travelling the continent for a bit. I won’t be back there for a while."

Yang Qing cast a subtle sideways glance at Chen Yu as he detected a trace of wanderlust in the appraiser’s voice. "Did those travels lead you here?" he asked, curiously, given he’d been wondering how the Vast Blue had managed to attract the services of someone with such an illustrious background.

The company gaining the services of someone from Gold Earth Bank, even though both were of different scales, made sense. After all, Gold Earth Bank was a mercantile organization; as long as one paid a sufficient price, while not easy, it would not be impossible to hire them for appraisal services, or even have one of their members present for an auctioning event.

Such cases were a commonality in their world.

But getting someone from Jade Leaf Academy, and someone with enough weight to hand out a blue token? That didn’t happen because you had enough benefits to offer. And even if it did, would the Vast Blue have enough to meet it?

As such, Yang Qing had assumed they had acquired Chen Yu’s services through the trade of a personal favor. He assumed Chen Yu knew one of their members well enough that he’d agree to show up out of that sentiment alone. But as it seemed, there was a chance that it may not even have been the case.

Chen Yu nodded. "Mmh. I was nearby, and I thought it wouldn’t be a bad thing to experience the splendor of the Dawn Cloud Tree myself," he said, admiring the leaves around him. "The last remnant of the Dawn Cloud Pill Array Pavilion. Such a shame." He paused to sigh.

"Its origin was damaged. If it’s this breathtaking, I wonder how it looked in its heyday," he added, looking around him.

Yang Qing frowned slightly as he looked around. Damaged origin? He hadn’t detected anything from the tree that showed signs of it.

The pupils of his eyes turned dark gold with a touch of orange, just like the Dawn Cloud Leaves.

Grand Sunfire Eyes.

He had evoked one of the techniques tied to his physique. Grand Sunfire Eyes allowed him to see the life flow of things in nature. Even without invoking the technique, it was something he could inherently do, thanks to his Dao, his physique, and the influence of his Purple Grade art. But with Grand Sunfire Eyes, his sensitivity would be further amplified.

Within Yang Qing’s sight, the overall surroundings remained the same, with one addition. There was now a light orange glow that had enveloped the area, thin streams of luminous mist spreading through it, curving elegantly as they moved like flowing water, their source the leaves above. The orange light in the surroundings was thinned, but on the leaves themselves it was blindingly bright, as though the sun itself were contained within them.

Every leaf that came under the view of his Grand Sunfire Eyes was like a miniature sun, its rays flowing like particles of liquid light, flooding the area around them.

When he looked up, those leaves clustered together looked no different from a galaxy of stars, radiating brilliantly with their orange light. The part that burned brightest, however, was the branches that held those leaves, and the trunk and main body. It was a field of flowing, radiant gold-orange light that seemed to stretch to the heavens themselves, given how tall and enormous the Dawn Cloud Tree was. He felt like he was staring at a vast celestial road of gold and orange stretching into the cosmos.

Yang Qing’s frown deepened as he looked at the branches, the trunk, and the leaves. The vibrancy of their flow suggested nothing was wrong with the tree. If there was even a slight wane, while he wasn’t prone to overestimating his ability, he felt he should be able to see something. After all, those eyes could see, and had seen, through the life flow of Ascendant Grade materials. If he could see through the life flow of a mature dragon vein or an Ascendant Grade tree, surely he could see through a top-tier Monarch Grade tree.

Not unless... Yang Qing’s left pupil shifted from gold-orange to pristine white as through that eye he invoked the counterpart of Grand Sunfire Eyes.

Grand Lunar Eye.

This one saw through illusions and falsehoods by reading the flow of the spirit and its essence. It was what Yang Qing used to see through illusions, detect hidden formation arrays, and at the same time, when the technique was invoked, granted him deep sensitivity to the ’emotion’ of things.

One technique saw through the vibrancy and pattern of the life flow, and the other saw through its nature.

Yang Qing’s right eye saw the golden stars and the gold-orange celestial road, while his left eye saw misty hues of blue, orange, and green surrounding the leaves, the main trunk carrying the deepest shades of blue and green.

The sight from both eyes blended and merged together to give Yang Qing an even deeper view of the tree.

"It’s too perfect," he murmured after carefully observing the tree and its leaves. The fluctuations of all the leaves within his field of vision, all the branches, and the section of the main trunk he observed all had perfectly synchronized fluctuations, as though they were carbon copies of one another.

Someone could say, Well, shouldn’t that be expected given it’s the same leaves from the same body?

Yang Qing’s answer would be, in part, yes. Shared similarity should be expected given the shared source, but only up to a point. Twins could look the same, but they had inherent differences, and it was the same with all things in nature.

Everything had its uniqueness.