Chapter 33: A Golden Light Probes the Spirit Veins

Qin Haoxuan was already agitated because of the incident with Master Guyun, and the lotus’s power was still acting up inside him. He was like a powder keg ready to explode. On any other day, he would have just laughed off such a comment. But today, he felt an instinctual surge of anger. He strode over to the weak-seeded disciple, his eyes filled with a menacing light, and stared at the trembling boy. “Are you looking to die?”

The disciple knew he was no match for Zhang Kuang, and even Zhang Kuang couldn’t get the upper hand against Qin Haoxuan. He was in no position to provoke him. But in front of everyone, he couldn’t show weakness. He forced himself to say, “Just you wait! I’ll settle this with you when my cultivation is stronger!”

Qin Haoxuan just smiled. Since the boy had backed down, he wouldn’t press the issue. Besides, with Elder Chu present, it wouldn’t be good to go too far. And more importantly, everyone else was already choosing their land. If he waited any longer, all the good plots would be gone.

He didn’t bother him further and joined the crowd moving into the five hundred acres of farmland.

Elder Chu shook his head as he watched. It seemed Qin Haoxuan’s Dao Heart was also becoming unstable. To fly into a rage over a single taunt… if the only thing he had going for him was also gone, then the boy was truly a lost cause. A youth is still a youth.

He watched as the other disciples got to work. Some knelt down, crumbling the soil between their fingers to taste its quality. Others injected their spiritual energy into the ground to survey it. Those who had paid attention in the previous day’s lecture on the Art of the Eight Trigrams began to combine it with today’s lesson on Feng Shui, taking out compasses to analyze the landscape. Of course, there were also those with poor comprehension who, despite listening attentively, were completely lost and just chose a nice-looking plot at random, planting the wooden sign with their name on it.

Elder Chu nodded in satisfaction, watching the disciples use every trick in their arsenal.

For an ordinary disciple, finding a true spirit field was extremely difficult. It was better to settle for a mid-grade plot. If they focused only on finding a spirit field and failed, by the time they gave up, all the mid-grade plots would be gone.

Both examining the soil and injecting spiritual energy were slow and inefficient methods. The disciples with special Immortal Seeds, like Zhang Kuang, Zhang Yang, and Li Jing, were all using a combination of the Art of the Eight Trigrams and Feng Shui.

Before long, Zhang Kuang and Li Jing had each found a relatively fertile spirit field, earning them both envious looks and a nod of approval from Elder Chu. As expected of Purple Seed disciples, they were superior to the others in every aspect.

Not long after them, Zhang Yang also found a spirit field. As disciples who had already completed the Rooting Stage, their senses were much sharper than ordinary disciples, so it was normal for them to find the spirit fields first.

Zhang Yang’s performance also earned him a second look from Elder Chu. Although he was a Gray Seed, his progress, comprehension, and strength were not much inferior to the Purple Seeds. If he continued like this, his future would be limitless.

Of the five disciples with special seeds, only Xu Yu and Murong Chao had not yet found a suitable plot.

It wasn’t that Xu Yu hadn’t learned the lessons well. It was because Qin Haoxuan had missed the morning lecture. To protect his pride and prevent others from gossiping, and to help him find a spirit field, she had come up with a plan. She pretended to be searching while muttering to herself, repeating Elder Chu’s lecture and analyzing the quality of the land as she went.

Her actions might have fooled others, but they didn’t fool Qin Haoxuan. He was deeply moved by the kind-hearted girl. When he had refused her offer of help out of pride, she hadn’t gotten angry. Instead, she had found this subtle way to teach him on the spot.

She was doing this because the earlier taunt had deeply affected her. To hear someone say that Brother Haoxuan was living off a woman under the halo of her Purple Seed status was a great insult to any man. And she believed he was not as weak as he appeared. She was sure that if she just told him what Elder Chu had taught, he would be able to find a spirit field on his own.

“Brother Haoxuan, this is a mid-grade field. Although it’s not as good as a true spirit field, if you plant here… after paying the sect’s contribution, you should still have enough to eat,” Xu Yu suddenly said in a low voice, walking up beside him and pointing to a decent-looking plot.

Seeing her hesitant expression, Qin Haoxuan couldn’t help but smile. This silly girl was still worried about his huge appetite, afraid he would pick a low-grade plot and starve. But a mid-grade field was not his goal. Why should Zhang Kuang and Li Jing get the spirit fields, and not him?

If he accepted that he was second-class, that he deserved a lesser plot, then how could he ever compete with them in the future?

After he shook his head and walked away, a weak-seeded disciple who had been following them joyfully planted his sign on the plot, looking as if he had won the lottery. But in Qin Haoxuan’s eyes, this person would never amount to much.

Cultivation is the cultivation of the heart. If one doesn’t even have an unyielding will, how can one fight against the heavens for one’s destiny? Those who resign themselves to their fate can never reach the peak.

Murong Chao, who had been watching, thought to himself that it wasn’t a good thing for a weak seed to be so ambitious.

But he had no time to mock Qin Haoxuan now, because he could feel the strange looks from others, looks of contempt. After all, of the five disciples with special seeds, he was the only one who hadn’t completed the Rooting Stage yet. He had even heard people whispering behind his back, “So what if he’s a Gray Seed? He’s still a waste. Even Zhang Yang has established his roots, but he hasn’t.”

The usually proud Murong Chao, upon hearing this, surprisingly did not get angry. He had already lost enough face. To cause a scene now would only make it worse.

So this time, whether for his future or his pride, he had to find a spirit field.

After about ten minutes, Xu Yu had gone over all the methods for choosing a spirit field. Qin Haoxuan had listened intently, but he knew that finding a spirit field with any of these methods was unlikely. To have a real chance, he had to use the Art of the Eight Trigrams, and with his current level of comprehension, that was a tall order.

He began to feel anxious. Nearly half of the 200 disciples had already chosen their fields, and the rest, including Murong Chao, were all competing for the few remaining good plots.

“Junior Sister, you should go find your own field. I understand everything you’ve said.”

There were very few spirit fields left; he couldn’t delay her any longer. He decided to send her on her way and search for himself.

Looking at the stubborn Qin Haoxuan, Xu Yu sighed and began to search for her own plot.

Staring at the remaining 400 empty plots, Qin Haoxuan began to consider his options. The method of examining the soil was too time-consuming and inaccurate. Injecting spiritual energy was like finding a needle in a haystack; it would take a day to check a single acre, and there were 400 acres left.

That left only the method of combining the Art of the Eight Trigrams with Feng Shui. But his comprehension wasn’t good enough. The conclusions he drew would likely be even more unreliable.

As he was worrying, an idea suddenly struck him.

He had once read in a book that Spiritual Sense had a wide range of applications, including in formations and alchemy. Could it be used here? Without hesitation, he calmed his mind, treated the land beneath his feet as an enemy, and began to stimulate the golden light in his mind.

He spread a small strand of the golden light over the one-acre plot beneath his feet. A strange thing happened.

He could feel that the land beneath him had only the faintest flicker of spiritual energy, like a candle in the wind, ready to be extinguished at any moment.

He then spread another strand of his Spiritual Sense to the mid-grade plot Xu Yu had pointed out earlier. Through the overgrown weeds, he could clearly feel a pulse of spiritual energy beneath the seemingly barren soil. It wasn’t strong, but it was much better than the low-grade plot.

The disciple who had claimed that plot saw him looking over and immediately became wary, shielding his sign and preparing to shout for help, thinking Qin Haoxuan had come to steal his land. The comical expression made Qin Haoxuan smile, and he quietly walked away.

For the next while, in the eyes of the others, he was acting like a lunatic. He would walk to a plot of land, stand there silently for ten breaths, and then walk away, without using any of the known methods of surveying, not even bending down.

Elder Chu, who was watching him from time to time, sneered to himself. Has he gone mad from his failure to find a spirit field? Even when using the Art of the Eight Trigrams, one had to bend down to examine the terrain, listen to the wind, and observe the mountains and rivers. Who had ever heard of a surveying method that involved just standing there?

Qin Haoxuan had no time to care what others thought. He was in a tense race to find a spirit field. Each plot was a full acre, and covering it with his Spiritual Sense consumed a great deal of energy. The more he surveyed, the slower he became. The excessive consumption of his Spiritual Sense had made his face pale, and he looked mentally exhausted.