Soaring the Heavens

Chapter 25: Four Realms of Arts

After listening, Miao Yi sweatdropped tremendously. He discovered that both husband and wife were really something else, but then he also realized that he himself had been extremely disrespectful. He wasn’t even aware of the situation and yet he still blindly called them by those names. It was no wonder Madame Shi Xiang didn’t look pleased. If you’re humiliating others, it would be strange for them to be pleased with you.

Miao Yi quickly stood up to apologize.

“You didn’t know, so you’re not at fault.” Luo Zhen waved her hands. After venting out the frustrations in her heart, she felt more relieved.

But after seeing the pathetic sight of the brooding Yan Xiu who was plied with drink, a raging fire emerged once more in her heart. Thus, she pointed and shouted angrily in a fit of rage. “What interminably rotten luck to be married to you! I am a great cultivator at White Lotus Third Grade and yet, I am ordered around by a couple of White Lotus Second Grade cultivators. What kind of man are you? When can you be a man for once, so I can hold my head up high and be a person with dignity?”

After berating him, she wiped her reddened eyes, flung her hand and left.

Speechless, Miao Yi could understand Luo Zhen’s resentful feelings. If he were in her shoes and being purposefully called ‘Shi Xiang, Shi Xiang’ with such frequency, he wouldn't be able to take it too.

However, Yan Xiu apparently had his own way of thinking.

“Brother Miao, don’t take offense at women.” The already tipsy Yan Xiu grabbed onto Miao Yi’s wrist, cheerfully saying, “What does reputation count as? Reputation means nothing. Is reputation more important than our own lives? Just surrendering ten times and she couldn’t even take it? She couldn’t even see, the number of people who’ve been replaced or have died in Transient Light Cave throughout these years? Only the two of us survived. And being able to survive is stronger than anything else. This is our ability. The Six Sages of Heaven and Earth want to make the cultivators kill each other, but I won’t ever fall for it!”

Miao Yi deeply felt that Yan Xiu’s words had an ounce of truth to them, but was taken aback after listening to the end, and so he asked dubiously, “The Six Sages of Heaven and Earth want us to kill each other? What do you mean by that?”

Yan Xiu looked at him as if he were an idiot, waved a hand and said, “Every living being’s power of will is only this much, but the number of cultivators keep increasing. Everyone wants to obtain the power of will to help with their cultivation. Have you ever imagined what will happen if things keep going on like this? There’s bound to be more cultivators acting recklessly in their desperation. Once things become chaotic, the first to suffer from disaster would be the myriad number of living beings who have been devoting their power of will. When that time comes, it would definitely bring disorder to the Six Sages of Heaven and Earth until they’d no longer be able to lie in the comfort of the incense and power of will. Regardless of how powerful they are, can they kill off all the cultivators in the world? Hence, all six of them came up with the rules of the game. They close one eye and open the other, and even if they have the power they won’t put a stop to it; allowing the Overlords of each respective domain to snatch the domain of another, allowing cultivators to kill incessantly, and using this to exhaust and reduce the number of cultivators in the world. After all, no matter who claims the domain, they would never dare reduce the devotion of the power of will to the Six Sages. Those that should be turned over, should still be turned over as per the usual. No matter how many cultivators have died, it had nothing to do with them. It can also help them to eliminate those who are a threat to their status. Brother, it’s precisely that I see it clearer than anyone else that makes me not an idiot like the others. What’s wrong with surrendering? It’s better than losing your own life!”

Miao Yi became speechless. If the situation was truly as what he’d said, he felt that he had been convinced by Yan Xiu’s words. The expression he gave when he looked at Yan Xiu was slightly admiring, as though he were looking at a man of wisdom. He discovered that this drunkard was in fact a real wise man who pretended to be a fool in disguise!

Miao Yi modestly asked for guidance, “Is there really no one who sees through the Six Sages’ scheme and wishes to stop them from doing this?”

“Stop them?” Yan Xiu took a swallow of wine and chuckled, “Their cultivation is the highest among all others in the entire cultivation world—a cultivation at the realm of Golden Lotus! How many would dare to oppose them?”

“Realm of Golden Lotus?” Miao Yi asked puzzlingly. “The Six Sages’ cultivation is only at the realm of Golden Lotus?”

Yan Xiu let out a burp and replied, “White Lotus, Blue Lotus, Red Lotus, Violet Lotus, Golden Lotus. The cultivation of these six has already reached the Golden Lotus realm. In this lifetime, we wouldn’t even have the chance to be able to touch the Violet Lotus realm, and yet, you still find it too low?”

He patted Miao Yi’s shoulders. “Brother, cultivation is the same as being a human being. You’ll need to be surefooted and not bite off more than what you can chew. You can boast like that in front of me. Just don’t do the same out there. Be careful not to make a laughing stock out of yourself.”

Miao Yi wasn’t boasting without shame, he just felt that it was different from what Lao Bai had told him, so with a dubious look, he asked, “Isn’t there an Iridescent Lotus realm above the Golden Lotus?”

“Iridescent Lotus?” Yan Xiu exclaimed in bewilderment. “I have never heard of anyone in the cultivation world to have attained the Iridescent Lotus realm. That realm you’ve mentioned only exists in the legends, which I think were rumored from the Boundless Secular World. In earlier years, someone found a few remnants of information. On it was recorded the hypothesis of the Iridescent Lotus, but no one has seen it before.”

“...” Miao Yi mumbled secretly under his breath, while holding his cup of wine, because what Lao Bai had claimed wasn’t the same at all.

Regardless of whether it was White Lotus, Blue Lotus or Golden Lotus, every realm had nine grades, with nine petals making up the nine grades.

And according to Lao Bai, he divided the cultivation realm into the Four Great Realms, namely the First Art of Traversing, Second Art of Levitation, Third Art of Soaring the Heavens and the Fourth Art of Infinity.

Cultivators with a cultivation of White Lotus and Blue Lotus could only traverse freely on land—and weren’t able to soar through the skies—therefore, Lao Bai declared it as the First Art of Traversing.

Cultivators with a cultivation of Red Lotus and Violet Lotus have the power to control objects and levitate through the sky, similar to the incident he saw at Ancient City where Fairy Hong Chen was levitating and flying, and so he designated it as the Second Art of Levitation.

As for cultivators with a cultivation of Golden Lotus and Iridescent Lotus, they were able to transcend beyond the stars and soar across the universe. Thus, Lao Bai defined it as the Third Art of Soaring the Heavens.

It’s worth mentioning that for the realm of Iridescent Lotus, every grade could bloom into nine different colored petals. Hence, attaining the highest ninth grade would mean having a total of 9,980 colored petals.

Previously, Lao Bai had mentioned that the Fourth Art of Infinity was actually the highest realm. He said that if one were to cultivate up to this stage, then it meant that person had reached the realm of boundless transcendence energy, and he would be able to change the pattern on his spiritual point to a design of his choice. Within the highest level in this realm, the phantom between one’s brows further allowed one to turn what was abstract into something real, eventually forming a pattern which belonged to the person himself. For example, for some people, it would be a vermillion dot between their brows.

Of course, Lao Bai said those words were exactly as what had been told to him by the Great Immortal he had once served.

Now Miao Yi couldn’t help but be skeptical about it. Since no one in the cultivation world had achieved the realm of Iridescent Lotus or the realm of boundless transcendence energy, how would the Great Immortal even know of this? Could it be that the Great Immortal had also based it on a legend he’d heard of?

From today onwards, Miao Yi was afraid to call both husband and wife as ‘Shi Xiang’ or ‘Madame Shi Xiang’ anymore. Honestly, his cultivation level didn’t give him the rights to follow what others called them anyway. Hence, he respectfully addressed them as Senior Yan and Senior Luo, respectively.

In this place, where everyone looked down upon the married couple, they were extremely happy to know that there was someone who, unexpectedly, respected them. After spending time in each other’s company, they began to wholeheartedly treat Miao Yi as their own. As a result, Miao Yi didn’t need to take care of his own meals anymore since whenever it was time to eat, Luo Zhen would urge Yan Xiu to invite Miao Yi to join them, improving their relationship even more.

Today, Miao Yi needed to head over to Hidden Dragon Valley to let the dragon steeds out. Luo Zhen then personally came over to carefully point out important matters that required attention. She then said she wanted to give a dragon steed to Miao Yi as a gift, but was afraid Miao Yi would detest it.

“I won’t, I won’t.” Miao Yi continuously waved his hands. He had drooled after a dragon steed for a long time, so why would he detest it?

After arriving at Hidden Dragon Valley, Miao Yi finally understood what she meant by detest. Luo Zhen pointed towards a dragon steed whose entire body was as black as charcoal. Thus, it was named ‘Charcoal’, which was a name given by Luo Zhen herself.