The next day, Mo Hua’s breakthrough to the late stage of Foundation Establishment spread throughout the sect and immediately caused a minor stir.

The esteemed array master of Taixu Gate, the leader of the array path, and the little senior brother of several thousand disciples had finally, like his junior brothers, broken through to the late stage of Foundation Establishment. This exceptional “bail” to the late stage of Foundation Establishment little senior brother finally no longer had to worry about “repeating a grade.”

Everyone in Taixu Gate, from top to bottom, breathed a sigh of relief.

Along the way, he encountered some sect elders who all smiled and nodded at Mo Hua, expressing congratulations.

Some of his junior brothers even specially set up a banquet in the dining hall, inviting Mo Hua for a big meal. Each person gave a small congratulatory gift to show their goodwill. “Congratulations, little senior brother, on successfully reaching the late stage of Foundation Establishment!”

Cheng Mo raised his cup and celebrated with a crowd of fellow disciples.

Mo Hua was touched but also felt they were being a bit exaggerated. It was just the late stage of Foundation Establishment…

Mo Hua was a little puzzled and asked Cheng Mo, “When you all reached the late stage of Foundation Establishment, did you celebrate like this too?” Cheng Mo shook his head, “No.”

Mo Hua was stunned, “No?”

“Um,” Cheng Mo said, “Our breakthrough to the late stage of Foundation Establishment was ordinary and nothing special, not worth mentioning. But little senior brother, you are different from us. Your breakthrough to the late stage of Foundation Establishment was really too hard, too strenuous, so it needs a special celebration.”

If Mo Hua didn’t know Cheng Mo was a straightforward person who spoke his mind, he would have thought this kid was being sarcastic. The crowd beside them also nodded in agreement:

“It’s too difficult for little senior brother to break through to the late stage of Foundation Establishment, it’s worth celebrating.” “…”

Mo Hua’s expression was subtle, and he finally sighed.

It was originally a happy occasion, but with everyone congratulating him in this way, Mo Hua always felt he was receiving “discrimination.”

But no matter what, this was after all the junior brothers’ good intentions. Although his mood was a bit complex, he still calmly accepted.

After several days, Wenren Wan, Elder Gu Hong from the Gu family, Gu Changhuai, Xia Dian Si from the Xia family, and other people familiar with Mo Hua all sent him gifts. Wenren Wan even specially prepared a banquet and invited Mo Hua for a big meal.

Because they didn’t want to delay Mo Hua’s cultivation, there was no grand fanfare. They just prepared several dishes that Mo Hua loved to eat at a restaurant in Taixu City. Mo Hua ate very happily.

After several days of excitement, Mo Hua’s heart began to settle down. Breaking through to the late stage of Foundation Establishment meant he just needed to consider matters related to the late stage of Foundation Establishment.

The path of cultivation is just like this, one hurdle after another. Having crossed this hurdle, there are still many hurdles waiting for oneself in the future. One should not be proud because of a temporary achievement.

Nor should one become anxious and slack off because the goal is vast.

Step by step, steadily walk the road under your feet.

Day after day, cultivate diligently, and comprehend little by little, only then can one finally wear down the stone and forge the great path to ascension. It seems dull, it seems long, but this is the true “shortcut.”

Only with a dao heart as firm as a rock, great willpower, enduring great hardships, and overcoming heavy dangers, can one finally reach the end, attain the dao and become immortal. Mo Hua calmed his heart and, as usual, diligently cultivated, practiced sword, and learned array methods.

But several days later, he suddenly thought of something:

“Why hasn’t Old Ancestor Dugu opened the door and grabbed me to practice sword?”

Mo Hua frowned.

Before, he had spent great effort to kill the divine remains and cut the evil fetus.

After that, his physical body was damaged and he was unconscious, cared for by Elder Murong for several days.

After recovering from his injuries, he was busy refining divine marrow, devouring divine thoughts, cracking the mystery array, and breaking through the bottleneck, too busy to care. Only when he came to his senses did he suddenly realize that seven days had already passed, and Old Ancestor Dugu still hadn’t found him.

“Did the old ancestor forget this matter?”

The old ancestor was already very old, having lived for countless years. It was normal for him to occasionally have a poor memory and forget things. Mo Hua waited patiently.

But he waited for several more days, and two “seven-day periods” had already passed, yet there was still no movement in the disciple residence. No void crack, no pair of skinny big hands, nothing at all.

“Old ancestor… does he not want to teach me anymore? Or is it that he had some accident?” Mo Hua’s brows furrowed slightly. He stretched out a finger and drew a bit in the air.

What a pity.

He was only in Foundation Establishment and couldn’t tear open a void crack.

He also couldn’t go to the back mountain and couldn’t see Old Ancestor Dugu, so there was no way to ask the old ancestor what exactly happened. Mo Hua was thus worried.

He felt that the old ancestor had the grace of “transmitting the dao and teaching skills” to him. Now that the old ancestor’s situation was unknown, he should do something for the old ancestor. Therefore, during the daytime, Mo Hua secretly slipped towards the back mountain while everyone was not paying attention.

But the back mountain was forbidden ground, so it was of course impossible for him to slip in.

He hadn’t even reached the back mountain when he was caught by an elder from the inner mountain.

Logically speaking, outer sect disciples privately entering the inner mountain should be punished, but Mo Hua’s situation was special. Who didn’t know the legend of him being “the old ancestor’s own grandson”? Not to mention his identity as the leader of the array path, the elder from the inner mountain just turned a blind eye.

“You can’t enter the inner mountain randomly. Go back early, I’ll just pretend I didn’t see, otherwise I can’t explain…” The inner mountain elder was still very amiable. “Um um, I just got lost.” Mo Hua said.

He could come up with excuses like this casually.

After leaving the inner mountain elder’s line of sight, Mo Hua walked around nearby again, but he couldn’t find a path leading to the back mountain at all. He was familiar with Taixu Gate again, but it was only limited to the outer mountain and outer sect.

The inner sect was located in the inner mountain, including the rarely visited back mountain, which was not originally within his “exploration” range. After circling several times without any results, Mo Hua had no choice but to go back.

If he turned around again and was caught by the inner mountain elder again, it would be really hard to explain.

The elder wasn’t a fool. Turning a blind eye once was enough. Pushing too far would be a bit offensive. Mo Hua sighed, turned around to leave, walked a few steps, and couldn’t help but turn his head to look again.

The ancient and vast Taixu Mountain, like a green dragon, was lurking in the border of Qianxue State.

The outer mountain stretched out like a dragon’s tail, but the back mountain was the true source of the mountain range, the true “dragon head.” This dragon head, however, towered into the clouds, hidden in deep clouds, looking mysterious and unfathomable. The high place was not cold, divine sense could not perceive anything, and even cause and effect could not be derived.

Mo Hua fundamentally didn’t know where the Sword Tomb was, nor did he know where Old Ancestor Dugu was guarding.

He vaguely had a feeling in his heart that it seemed like some array was isolating everything, not allowing outsiders to spy, suppressing the most secret things in the deep clouds, on the ethereal mountain peak. “Taixu Gate, perhaps, still hides many secrets…

Even, still hides great dangers…

Need a high enough realm to be able to contact.

Mo Hua stood gazing at the back mountain, his gaze deep, not knowing how long, before silently turning around and leaving along the green stone mountain path…

Disciple residence. Mo Hua sat alone.

There was no response from Old Ancestor Dugu, and no one gave him a “small stove” for opening the sword path. Mo Hua felt both regret and worry.

But the back mountain was forbidden ground, and besides breaking open the void, he had no way to enter.

Even looking at it now, the back mountain was possibly already sealed, and the space was locked. Even if he could really break open the void, it was estimated he couldn’t enter. Mo Hua sighed.

“Hope old ancestor, he, blessed by heaven, one day, can see him again…” Mo Hua silently wished in his heart.

After that, he could only temporarily put this matter aside and begin to continue considering his own cultivation matters. After all, the first duty of a cultivator is to cultivate.

As long as a cultivator is not dead, they just need to cultivate. A cultivator who doesn’t cultivate is better off dead.

“I am now in the late stage of Foundation Establishment. The next step is the Gold Core…”

“But I just broke through not long ago, my cultivation is still not ripe enough, and there is actually still a considerable distance from the true Gold Core.” “Moreover, the Gold Core is not that simple…”

Mo Hua considered it for a while and only then discovered that there were still many things he needed to do if he wanted to form a core.

He walked the path of “divine sense proving the dao” and forged a divine thought dao foundation. Therefore, before breaking through to the Gold Core in cultivation, his divine sense must first form a core and reach twenty patterns. That way, once his cultivation broke through to the Gold Core, his divine sense would further multiply and even undergo a qualitative change.

Before formally forming the core, the stronger the divine sense, the better.

Above twenty patterns, each additional pattern would deepen his divine thought foundation. And now his divine sense was only a thread away from the twenty patterns Gold Core.

But this thread didn’t seem to be something that could be achieved through simple cultivation or “eating” evil spirits. It should require some opportunity, or some enlightenment, or “eating” some special things.

But exactly how to do it, and as the opportunity hadn’t arrived, Mo Hua was also a bit unclear. Divine sense forming a core required an opportunity.

On the contrary, another problem was urgent, even already urgent to the point where he had to consider it now: “Magic treasure!”

Essential for breaking through to the Gold Core, interdependent with the Gold Core cultivator’s life, and to a certain extent, determining the combat power of a Gold Core realm cultivator—the life magic treasure!

The matter of life magic treasure could be delayed a bit before, but now Mo Hua was already in the late stage of Foundation Establishment. The next step was to consider forming a core. He really couldn’t delay any longer. If he didn’t find a way and just kept delaying like this, he feared that forming a core would be hopeless in this lifetime.

But the problem lay in the fact that it wasn’t that Mo Hua really wanted to delay, but that there was truly no way.

He thought and thought but fundamentally couldn’t figure out what he should choose as his “life magic treasure.” Mo Hua thought for a while, then sank his divine sense into his sea of consciousness and came to the dao stele. With a slim chance in mind, he softly asked: “Are you willing to be my ‘life magic treasure’?”

The dao stele completely ignored him.

Mo Hua again secretly glanced at the “tribulation lightning” on the dao stele. Before he even opened his mouth, he immediately dismissed this “overstepping” idea. Using tribulation lightning as a magic treasure, he feared he wouldn’t even wait to form a core before he himself would be struck to ashes.

What’s more, tribulation lightning was not a spirit tool and could not be used as a magic treasure.

Mo Hua exited the sea of consciousness again and took out the piece of Taixu bamboo sword that Old Ancestor Dugu had given him.

This piece of bamboo sword seemed ordinary, but it contained the ancient sword intent of Taixu Gate and was the source of the sword path cultivated with the heart blood of successive masters of Taixu Gate. “Use this bamboo sword as my life magic treasure?”

Mo Hua thought for a while, then shook his head.

“This was sent by Old Ancestor Dugu… no, it was ‘lent’ to me.”

It contained the top sword flow of Taixu Gate. How could he just refine it into a magic treasure privately? What’s more, he was not a pure sword cultivator.

In the divine thought world, he relied on divine sense to transform into a sword and divine sense to become daoist. His sword method could be used for close combat and long-range attacks, perhaps unmatched in power. But in the real world, his orthodox sword cultivator means were very weak.

He did have a unique skill called “sword controlling,” but this sword controlling meant exploding one spirit sword each time it was controlled. He couldn’t possibly explode his own life magic treasure…

“No good…” Mo Hua shook his head. “Sword is not good, then.”

Mo Hua flipped through his storage bag and took out a copper coin.

This was the copper coin his Master had given him. Before entering the Ten Thousand Demons Valley, he had used it to divine good or bad fortune. “Copper coin magic treasure?”

Mo Hua thought for a while, still shaking his head, “It can’t kill, it can’t defend, it can only divine. Like a ‘fortune teller’, what kind of appearance is that? He can’t possibly fight other Gold Cores who are using blades, swords, and magic treasures to kill each other.

When fighting, he takes out his life copper coin and divines a divination first…

“Even when divining, it has to be done secretly. It can’t be done openly. Taking this as a magic treasure…

Mo Hua flipped through his storage bag again. There were also some spirit tools and treasures inside, but this one was not good, that one was not good. No matter how he picked, none of them seemed suitable. He had no choice but to go find people to ask for advice again.

Anyway, he had come to the border of Qianxue State specifically to cultivate and seek knowledge. If he knew everything, he wouldn’t have joined a sect. Mo Hua first asked around some of his junior brothers.

However, these junior brothers of his, what cultivation method they cultivated, what dao methods they learned, what inherited spirit tools they raised, what life magic treasures they cast, what quality Gold Cores they formed, were all arranged early by their families, elders, and parents.

All paths were paved early.

They didn’t need to worry about anything; they just needed to follow the road and walk forward step by step. Mo Hua was a loose cultivator. Not to mention Gold Core, even Foundation Establishment was once a luxury.

The experiences of these junior brothers from “world families” could not be learned at all.

Mo Hua then went to ask for advice from the teaching elder.

The teaching elder had been transmitting the dao and teaching skills for many years and had profound knowledge of cultivation. He did give Mo Hua many suggestions. Mo Hua’s status was special, and he was also likable.

The teaching and elders in the sect, both publicly and privately, would do their best for him, giving him all sincere suggestions, afraid that Mo Hua would suffer a loss in the matter of life magic treasure. Some elders even endured the pain of taking out some of their own private inherited methods.

But there were too many suggestions, and Mo Hua was a bit overwhelmed.

And the problem was, these suggestions were all based on a deep family foundation and a rich inheritance of cultivation resources. They also wasted time, wasted spirit objects, and wasted spirit stones even more. The power of the final life magic treasure was also just equivalent to that of the direct descendants of general world families.

Of course, this was actually already very impressive.

After all, Mo Hua’s starting point was really too low. Now, temporarily embracing the Buddha’s feet, being able to cast a magic treasure equivalent to that of the direct descendants of world families was already enough to see the profoundness of Taixu Gate’s dao-transmitting foundation.

Logically speaking, a life magic treasure at the level of a direct descendant of a world family was already a “luxury” for Mo Hua.

As a loose cultivator, being able to cross over heavy cultivation barriers and now, like the direct descendants of world families, casting a superior life magic treasure was already a “rise to the sky in one step.” Greed is not a good thing; one cannot demand too much.

But the problem lay in the fact that the cost of casting this “life magic treasure” was really too high.

Moreover, because he was temporarily embracing the Buddha’s feet, already in the late stage of Foundation Establishment, starting to raise a life magic treasure at this time lacked the long “nurturing” process, and the consumption of casting a life magic treasure would be greater. If he always stayed in Taixu Gate, that would still be fine.

Back in the sect, relying on the old ancestor, safely and steadily spending time and resources, he would raise the “life magic treasure” well. But Mo Hua knew his own situation.

It was impossible for him to always stay in Taixu Gate.

He cultivated in Taixu Gate for the sake of seeking knowledge, for cultivation, for making up for the shortcomings of his loose cultivator origin, lack of cultivation vision, no cultivation connections, and missing complete cultivation inheritance.

He couldn’t always stay here; he still had more important things to do. He still had his Master to save.

There would be a day, even not too long, when he would leave Taixu Gate.

Once he left Taixu Gate and entered the Nine Provinces alone, at that time, the wind and rain would be floating, dangers would be everywhere, and there would be no stable environment and sufficient resources for him to raise his life magic treasure. Moreover, these inherited life magic treasures of world families were all prepared for geniuses with superior, even top-grade spirit roots, and were not very suitable for Mo Hua’s bone structure and his overall cultivation methods.

Mo Hua was helpless and finally went to ask for advice from Old Mister Xun again.

Old Mister Xun was sitting in the elder residence. A heavenly mechanism disk was placed in front of him, and it seemed he had some matter. These days, he had not closed his eyes, but when Mo Hua asked a question, he still thought seriously, then slowly said:

“I also considered this problem, but I never found a good method, so I didn’t mention it to you.” Old Mister Xun looked at Mo Hua and said with some regret:

“I’ll tell you the truth, you have already passed the best age to nurture a life magic treasure. At this time, no matter what you choose, it will not be completely as you wish…” “I understand.” Mo Hua nodded.

“Then what do you want to ask?”

Mo Hua then asked for advice: “Old mister, what direction should I choose for my life magic treasure? Should it be a blade or sword type attack magic treasure, or a golden bell cover or iron cloth shirt type defense magic treasure, or a hidden, scout, or escape type magic treasure?”

Old Mister Xun pondered for a moment and said:

“You are an array master. As long as you know array methods, one leads to a hundred. You are actually not suitable for this kind of single-function type magic treasure, especially blade or sword type killing magic treasures.”

“Life magic treasure is interdependent with the cultivator’s life. Damage to one damages both. Your physical body is originally fragile. Cultivating blade or sword type magic treasures to ‘fight hard’ with others is really unwise. In case of damage from fighting, the backlash is also fierce.”

“A minority of array masters will also nurture some array disks or array pen type magic treasures that amplify the speed of drawing arrays or elevate the level of drawing arrays.”

“But this kind of magic treasure inheritance is very niche, and the amplification is very slight. Your array method foundation is originally profound, and you draw arrays quickly. This amplification, for you, is something you can have or not.” Old Mister Xun slowly said, “Therefore… rather than thinking about using magic treasures to kill or amplify array methods, it might be better to use magic treasures to supplement…”

“Supplement?” Mo Hua was startled.

“Not bad, life magic treasure, integrated with your life. Borrow the life magic treasure to supplement your own deficiencies.” Old Mister Xun nodded. “Supplement what?” Mo Hua asked.

“Your biggest problem…” Old Mister Xun pondered, “is your weak physical body and thin spiritual power.” “Therefore, the first choice is a magic treasure that supplements spiritual power.”

“The second choice is a magic treasure that strengthens the physical body.”

“If there is really no way, just like most array masters, cultivate a hidden technique or escape technique, a life-saving or escape type magic treasure.” Mo Hua pondered, “Supplement spiritual power, strengthen physical body, escape…”

Old Mister Xun nodded slightly, “But what specifically to cast, you need to choose yourself. It’s not good for me to make a decision for you.” Old Mister Xun knew Mo Hua’s true “background” and also knew that there were some causes and effects on his body.

But he was not particularly clear about Mo Hua’s line of inheritance’s path, especially since it was related to that person and that sect, which often could not be measured by common sense. Old Mister Xun was afraid of doing a bad thing with good intentions and pointing Mo Hua in the wrong direction. Therefore, he could only give suggestions.

The specifics still required Mo Hua to choose for himself, according to his own, or visible, or invisible, strange inheritances. Mo Hua nodded, “Thank you, old mister, for pointing it out. I understand.”

“Um,” Old Mister Xun nodded, thought for a moment, and then said: “If you need anything, just ask. If you need any ’embryo’, tell me, and I’ll go through the Taixu Gate warehouse to see if there is anything suitable…”

Old Mister Xun did his best for Mo Hua’s matters. Mo Hua gratefully said: “Thank you, old mister!”

Old Mister Xun silently looked at Mo Hua and warmly encouraged: “Cultivate well, the cultivation path has many twists and turns. Take it step by step, never be discouraged.” “Um!” Mo Hua nodded.

After bidding farewell to Old Mister Xun, Mo Hua returned to the disciple residence.

Combining Old Mister Xun’s suggestions, he again found some cultivation classics, such as the Compendium of Cultivator Magic Treasure Categories, Magic Treasure Basics, Gold Core Starting from Life Magic Treasure, and so on, and read them a bit.

But the more he read, the more he felt dizzy and found it difficult to choose. Mo Hua couldn’t help but be tangled:

“Life magic treasure, what should I choose exactly?”