Chapter 409 - 387: Floating Clouds and Morning Dew, Withering and Flourishing Years

Song Ciwan had no idea if the Heir of Prince Yun was surprised.

In the Cultivation Room, Song Ciwan had washed away her attachments. Afterward, she was no longer obsessed with suppressing her Level.

Of course, while she no longer intentionally suppressed her cultivation, she was in no hurry to break through either.

Her state of mind had changed, as if she had finally found a perfectly composed rhythm.

After her lifespan reached one hundred sixty-seven thousand, three hundred years, she discovered that her control over the Sun and Moon Wheel of Formless Life and Death had advanced even further.

At one point, she didn’t even need to use the Sun and Moon Wheel of Formless Life and Death. With a mere thought, she casually tossed out a potted Spirit Grass she had previously collected on Celestial Dragon Mountain. As the pot landed, Song Ciwan pointed a finger from a distance, and a peculiar ripple emanated outward.

The next moment, the Spirit Grass in the pot on the ground suddenly began to grow at a frenzied pace.

The Spirit Grass grew wildly, seeming to experience the flow of decades, even centuries, in a single instant.

It went from a tiny seedling to, in an instant, having its aura surge as Spiritual Qi overflowed from it.

A moment later, the Spirit Grass actually produced seeds!

The seeds detached from the top of the Spirit Grass, pattering down into the soil of the flowerpot below.

Tender sprouts pushed through the soil, unfurling their leaves and growing into several new Spirit Grasses.

But at the same time, the original Spirit Grass that had produced the seeds went from lush and vibrant to having its leaves turn yellow-gray in the blink of an eye, before finally withering away...

In the span of just a few breaths, it had experienced its entire life process: from youth to its prime, and from its prime to its decline.

Just as the seed-bearing Spirit Grass withered and decayed, and the new Spirit Grasses grew lush and upward, reaching their most vigorous stage, Song Ciwan suddenly felt a sharp pain in her Dantian.

Her hand faltered, and she was instantly jolted from the wonderful state of immersion she had felt while casting the spell.

Song Ciwan pulled back her hand, her heart pounding.

She pressed a hand to her chest. The pounding wasn’t an emotional metaphor but a literal description.

The excessive consumption of True Qi and overexertion of her mind had forced her heart to beat faster, just to sustain the high-stress state she had put her body through.

After she rested for a moment, the Sutra of Sitting and Forgetting began to circulate on its own inside her body, rapidly restoring her True Qi.

She bent over, reaching out to carefully inspect the potted plant on the ground.

The Spirit Grass in the pot was a Two-star Level plant called Twenty-Beard Grass. As its name suggests, Twenty-Beard Grass normally takes twenty years to mature—

Of course, with a Spirit Field and special cultivation methods, the maturation time for Twenty-Beard Grass could be significantly shortened.

But that was beside the point. The natural maturation time for Twenty-Beard Grass was twenty years.

And just now, struck by a flash of inspiration, Song Ciwan had, with a single point of her finger, caused the Twenty-Beard Grass to live through twenty, thirty, or even forty years in an instant.

With so much time passing, even a Spirit Grass would wither.

One part withers while another thrives. One part declines as another grows.

This was the cycle of life, and the sigh of time itself.

Song Ciwan carefully contemplated these changes while silently calculating the cost of what she had just done.

As an ordinary Two-star Level Spirit Grass, the Spiritual Qi contained within a Twenty-Beard Grass was average at best. Even if one were to bundle a hundred fully mature stalks, extract all their Spiritual Qi and medicinal properties to replenish Song Ciwan’s True Qi, it would be just a drop in the ocean.

Compared to Song Ciwan’s vast Dantian Sea, the medicinal power of the Twenty-Beard Grass was so faint it likely wouldn’t even make a ripple.

And yet, when Song Ciwan pointed her finger to "force-grow" the Twenty-Beard Grass, she had expended nearly all the True Qi in her Dantian!

From this perspective, the ability Song Ciwan had just grasped in a flash of inspiration seemed utterly impractical.

If she were to rely on this ability to "force-grow" Spirit Grass, Song Ciwan would incur a devastating loss whether she sold the mature plants or used them herself.

However, it was important to note that the Spirit Grass hadn’t matured under Song Ciwan’s finger because she actually possessed some Wood Element "growth-hastening" ability. Fundamentally, what she had just done wasn’t "growth-hastening" at all.

It wasn’t "growth-hastening." It was time acceleration, a theft of years, the erosion of ages!

The longer her lifespan, the deeper Song Ciwan’s understanding of time became.

At this point, she could control time on a small scale even without relying on the Sun and Moon Wheel of Formless Life and Death.

Of course, by using a Spiritual Artifact, her expenditure would be far lower, and her methods of application far more varied. But there was a fundamental difference between possessing an ability innately and possessing it through a Spiritual Artifact.

This was a qualitative leap!

Song Ciwan silently gave the Magic she had just comprehended a name: Morning Dew.

Floating Clouds and Morning Dew, vanishing in an instant.

The Dew Skill was still very crude. This was not the first time Song Ciwan had comprehended a Magic on her own, but of all the Magic she had grasped, this was the most difficult one to use.

But Song Ciwan broke into a smile. She put away the potted plant on the floor, and her consciousness sank into the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven, which had always floated upon her Dantian Sea.

The Vast Sea Grotto Heaven was supposed to be the world’s foremost personal dimension. It was a true Grotto Heaven, fundamentally a layer higher than the "Secondary Grotto Heavens" like the Bright Moon Grotto Heaven that Song Ciwan had heard of.

Unfortunately, while the Grotto Heaven was of a high essence, its Level was low when she first obtained it.

No matter how powerful the Dragon Pearl was, it couldn’t provide the Energy required for an entire, complete Grotto Heaven.

Song Ciwan had sold the Dragon Pearl to obtain the Grotto Heaven. At first, the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven was almost completely primordial chaos.

There was only a vast, boundless sea with a tiny, lonely island at its center. Floating above the island was a single drop of Heavy Water.

Due to an energy imbalance within the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven, the Five Elements could not circulate properly. As a result, Song Ciwan had only ever been able to use it as a special kind of storage space.

Not only were items placed inside the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven completely shielded from outside detection, they were also subject to the Grotto Heaven’s suppressive force.

Furthermore, the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven could maintain the vitality of plants; potted Spirit Plants with their soil could grow perfectly well inside. This was unlike ordinary Storage Pouches, where Spirit Plants had to be sealed in a Jade Box to prevent their medicinal properties from dissipating.

It was just a pity that while plant life could enter the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven, animal life could not.

Song Ciwan had acquired piles of materials by selling things off with the Heaven and Earth Scale, but very few of them could be used to complete the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven.

She carefully sensed everything within the Vast Sea Grotto Heaven, then began to sift through the Heaven and Earth Scale.

In a tranquil mood, Song Ciwan used up all her remaining selling attempts for the day.

She wasn’t selling anything else, choosing mainly to sell various human desires she had previously collected from a single individual but had not yet traded.

When sold for the first time, this type of human desire could yield various Cultivation Techniques. Subsequently selling human desires from that same person would only grant cultivation time.

[You have sold an enlightenment: the Enlightenment of a Righteous Qi Realm Painter. Weight: five jin and seven liang. You have obtained the Third Layer of the Sutra of Sitting and Forgetting.]

This enlightenment came from Aunt Wen. Because its qi was over five jin—and a Righteous Qi Realm Painter was equivalent to a Cultivator at the Divinity Transformation Stage—Song Ciwan could have specified the outcome of the sale.

But she hadn’t specified anything. ’I can’t believe this sale gave me the Third Layer of the Sutra of Sitting and Forgetting directly!’