Chapter 560: Kunlun Mountain, Perfected Jin Ding!

[Chen Dyson picked up the snake fang and examined it, but had no idea what it was.]

["I can't identify it, but my master might recognize it."]

["Who's your master?"]

["Perfected Jin Ding of Kunlun Mountain."]

["Could you take me to meet him?"]

["Sure. I'll book a flight."]

["No need."]

[You grabbed Chen Dyson and leaped into the air, stepping onto the Divine Art "Ten Thousand Mile Wind Travel" as you flew toward the Kunlun Mountains with him.]

["You can fly?!"]

["To be precise, this is a Divine Art, but there's nothing wrong with saying I can fly."]

["My god! What cultivation level are you?"]

["The Transcendent Realm."]

["The, the, the, the..."]

["Was that a divine mark you just used?"]

["Yes, it was a human mark, one of the divine marks."]

["Oh? A human mark?"]

[Under the Alien Races' rule, the Alien Races of the Celestial River local galaxy divided divine marks into civilian marks, noble marks, and imperial marks.]

[The people of the Torch Society knew the ancient secrets recorded in books from the Celestial Emperor era, including that the original names of the divine marks were human marks, earth marks, and heaven marks.]

[Now, cultivators on Earth also classified divine marks as human marks, earth marks, and heaven marks.]

[Could it be?]

[You flew straight to the towering Kunlun Mountains with Chen Dyson.]

[Following his directions, you arrived at a Daoist temple that was a tourist attraction.]

[It was peak tourist season, and the place was packed with visitors. Despite the sheer cliffs, people filled the area, rubbing shoulders and jostling one another.]

[You were flying too fast and couldn't brake in time, accidentally letting the tourists see you.]

[You had been on Earth for a month and knew that cultivators here kept a low profile, doing their best not to display their abilities or supernatural powers in public.]

["Sorry, I think I was flying too fast."]

[Chen Dyson reacted quickly.]

["It's fine. Just wave down at them, like I am."]

[You did as he suggested.]

[The tourists packed below all pulled out their phones and started taking pictures.]

["Today's performance is amazing! You can't see the wires at all!"]

["What century is this? Who still uses old-fashioned wires? The actors must be wearing portable jetpacks."]

["Holy crap! Those things are expensive! Did this tourist attraction really spend that much?"]

["That young actor is pretty good. He looks like he can really fly!"]

[You were at a loss for words.]

[Sometimes, people really were easy to fool.]

[You hurriedly flew away from the crowded area with Chen Dyson.]

["Senior! You've gone too far!"]

["Too far? Is your master in that Daoist temple we just passed?"]

["Yes."]

["But that place is full of tourists..."]

["Right. My master is an NPC in the temple. He plays a Daoist priest who tells fortunes and reads people's faces, though he really is a Daoist priest."]

["He doesn't cultivate? He can still do that kind of business?"]

["He cultivates, but he has to make a living too, doesn't he?"]

[The cultivation environment on Earth was truly out of the ordinary. It had genuinely opened your eyes.]

[You and Chen Dyson found an empty spot to land, then changed into casual clothes. Looking like two tourists out for a hike, you joined the crowd, bought tickets, waited in line, and entered the Daoist temple.]

[There were quite a few Daoist priests in the temple. Some were sweeping the floor, some were practicing calligraphy, and others were meditating.]

[You couldn't tell whether they were truly cultivating the Dao or just putting on a show as NPCs at a tourist attraction.]

[Either way, when you glanced over them, none seemed to have any cultivation level.]

[Chen Dyson's master had a private alchemy room. Visitors who wanted a fortune told or their face read had to buy a ticket for two hundred yuan and then pay by the minute once inside.]

[That was a pretty steep price.]

[So despite the crowds, not many visitors came to see this NPC.]

[It wasn't long before it was your turn.]

[Chen Dyson entered with you.]

["What would you like to ask, sir? Love? Career? Or the certainty of life and death?"]

[Chen Dyson's master looked quite old, with white hair and beard and a deeply wrinkled face.]

[He wore a Daoist robe bearing a yin-yang symbol, and rested one arm on a whisk. Both he and the room were spotless.]

[He sat upright on a meditation cushion, his eyes half-closed, with a burner of sandalwood incense beside him.]

[He really did look like an enlightened master.]

[At the very least, he lived up to the two-hundred-yuan starting price.]

[You used the Divine Sense ability of "Traffic Light" to check his cultivation level.]

[You discovered that among the cultivators you had encountered on Earth during this time, he was the closest to the Core Formation realm.]

["You are Perfected Jin Ding, aren't you?"]

["Obviously. Isn't it written on the sign outside? If I weren't, that'd be false advertising, and the tourism bureau would fine me."]

["Uh... Could you drop the act for a moment? I'm here to meet a Qi Transformation, Nine Rotations cultivator, Chen Dyson's master, Perfected Jin Ding!"]

[At the words "Qi Transformation, Nine Rotations," Perfected Jin Ding's eyes snapped open, fixing on the person before him.]

["Your aura is restrained, deep, and weighty, like a vast ocean or a brilliant starry sky. You... are certainly no cultivator from Earth!"]

[Then he spotted one of his disciples, Chen Dyson.]

["Little Chen, did you bring him here?"]

[Chen Dyson bowed respectfully.]

["Master, Senior Chen Dong saved my life. To find out what the Sakura Country cultivators who ambushed me were after, he brought me here to meet you."]

[Perfected Jin Ding stood and clasped his hands in greeting.]

["Thank you, fellow Daoist, for saving my disciple's life."]

["Think nothing of it. As it happens, he's my relative too."]

["Oh? Aren't you from beyond Earth?"]

["It's a long story..."]

[You didn't tell them that you had traveled from Earth to the Void Realm, but you did tell them that you were indeed from beyond Earth, had been stranded near the Solar System by an accident, and could no longer find the Channel back.]

[At the word "Channel," Perfected Jin Ding fell into thought.]

["By the Channel you mentioned, do you mean the Great Void Passage?"]

["I'm not sure. Where we're from, we always just called it a Channel."]

["Could we speak somewhere more private? There's something I'd like to show you."]

["Lead the way."]

[Perfected Jin Ding asked Chen Dyson to go ask the tourist attraction's manager for time off, then led you to the temple's rear courtyard.]

[You passed through the back gate and followed a rugged mountain path.]

[Along the way, you crossed sheer cliffs and ravines that ordinary people could never traverse or walk across, eventually arriving at a cave.]

["More than a hundred years ago, the government discovered this place while developing the tourist attraction. We call it the 'Cave of Origins.'"]

[Actually, you had noticed it when you approached Kunlun Mountain. The Immortal Qi here seemed slightly denser than elsewhere.]

[The closer you got to this Cave of Origins, the more obvious the feeling became.]

[It was as if all the Immortal Qi in the surrounding area had seeped out of this cave.]