Chapter 178 - Silvermoon City
Young Master An left with the flight of dragons, leaving a tragic scene in his wake!
With the battle having come to an end, the turbulent seas had calmed down, leaving the school of black tortoises endlessly weeping and wailing.
"Elder Miao, my father died so tragically!"
"Once those dragons came, those sea beasts who used to flatter us all ran away!"
"Elder Miao, two hundred black tortoises have been eaten by them, and another three hundred have suffered varying injuries!"...
The group of black tortoises endlessly wept out in grief. There were still many corpses lying everywhere. At the sight of this, Miao Chen"s face turned ugly. Nonetheless, he still consoled everyone.
Meanwhile, Gu Hai and his team were waiting in the sky.
Only when the dusk arrived did Miao Chen fly back up to the flying s.h.i.+p.
"Your Royal Majesty, it was really a close call; otherwise, our clan would have been completely annihilated!" Miao Chen stated with an unsightly look on his face.
Gu Hai nodded and said, "You go and console them, okay! When they have been rea.s.sured, pack up everything and go to Nine-Five Island. I have already instructed Gu Qin, a nearby sea domain will be your resting area!"
Miao Chen nodded his acknowledgment. "Yes, thank you very much, Your Royal Majesty! Your Royal Majesty, in your trip to the Ying Province, please be wary of them! That Ghost Face is about to open the Heavenly Palace!"
"Rest a.s.sured!" Gu Hai nodded.
"Mister Shangguan, will you be coming with us?" Miao Chen looked to Shangguan Hen.
Shangguan Hen"s ident.i.ty needed to be kept secret, that"s why Miao Chen addressed him as Mister Shangguan.
"No, I will be going with Your Royal Majesty to Ying Province! Take care of yourself along the way!" Shangguan Hen said solemnly.
"Alright!" Miao Chen nodded to Shangguan Hen.
Having said what he needed to, Miao Chen returned back to the sea.
Meanwhile, the nearby Grandmaster Liunian"s eyes were filled with amazement. This Gu Hai has truly subdued Miao Chen! Are you kidding me?
"Hall Lord, thank you very much!" Gu Hai looked to Long Wanqing.
"You don"t need to thank me! In fact, even if we did nothing, Miao Chen could still have dealt with Ghost Face. That Ghost Face might be opening his Heavenly Palace soon enough, but when all is said and done, he still hasn"t, he is just at the peak of the Nascent Soul Stage!" Long Wanqing said with a smile.
"No, even if Miao Chen could deal with him, the end result would not have differed much. During their fight, the dragons most likely would have attacked the black tortoises! The black tortoises would have still suffered a huge loss! Today, each and every black tortoise is very important!" Gu Hai shook his head.
On another side, as Grandmaster Liunian waved his hand, and the crew quickly controlled the flying s.h.i.+p.
"If you really want to thank me, teach me weiqi, okay? This time, you can"t say you haven"t played with anyone for a few decades!" Long Wanqing said with a straight face.
"Since Hall Lord wants to learn, this Gu Hai will naturally teach without reserve!" Gu Hai replied with a smile.
There was still some time before the flying s.h.i.+p reached the Divine Continent. During this time, Gu Hai asked Long Wanqing a bit about the situation of the Divine Continent. Long Wanqing replied without reserve. The two chatted very happily.
After several days, inside a chamber on the White Cloud...
Gu Hai had entered a closed-door training.
Placed before him was the True Dragon Golden Core Exercise.
At this moment, Gu Hai was carefully studying this exercise.
"The cultivation of Golden Core Stage is to impact the Heart, Liver, Spleen, Kidney, and Lungs with True Yuan, opening the five chakras: the heart chakra, liver chakra, spleen chakra, kidney chakra, and lung chakra! With the dantian as primary and the five chakras as auxiliaries, gather True Yuan! Aren"t these five chakras like dantian? So, in other words, the Golden Core Stage is about opening five dantian-like chakras?" Gu Hai"s eyes flickered, perplexed.
Immediately afterwards, Gu Hai sank his consciousness into his dantian. Inside his dantian, the spherical-shaped True Yuan was slowly revolving. Above it, there seemed to be a whirlpool, absorbing Spirit Qi and converting it into True Yaun.
Inside the True Yuan sphere, there was a small purple dragon-like existence, cruising about ceaselessly.
This small purple dragon was imaginary, yet real at the same time. It was the True Dragon congealed by the True Dragon Xiantian Exercise. However, as Gu Hai infused a wisp of his consciousness into it, he was able to move this small dragon with his will.
Under the control of Gu Hai"s consciousness, the small dragon swam out of the True Yuan sphere, making its way out of the dantian and into Gu Hai"s meridians, while leading the True Yuan with it.
After swimming once around Gu Hai"s meridians, it slowly swam its way into Gu Hai"s heart. At the endpoint of the heart"s meridian, there seemed to be a grayish ma.s.s of energy.
Suddenly, the small dragon, guiding a lot of True Yuan, charged into this grayish ma.s.s of energy.
BOOM!
A fierce tremor ran through Gu Hai"s heart. Owing to the subsequent excruciating pain, Gu Hai stopped immediately. The gray ma.s.s of energy shook slightly, but nonetheless was still settled there firmly.
"The heart chakra! This is the entrance of the heart chakra? I need to attack it to open the heart chakra? However, the current True Yuan force seems to be a bit lacking... no, I should be lacking some sort of opportunity!?" Gu Hai"s eyes turned a bit dull and, lost.
The small dragon swam down the meridians. When it swam to the lungs, indeed, a grayish entrance seemed to be there as well!
The lung chakra could not be opened, either.
Spleen chakra, liver chakra, kidney chakra.
Gu Hai moved the small dragon again. But even if he wanted to open the points, it could not be done in a single stroke. The True Yuan needed to be acc.u.mulated, and at the same time, he also needed an opportunity.
After cultivating for two days, Gu Hai left the chamber.
Long Wanqing was standing alone at the bow, gazing into the distance. The sun was going down in the west. The golden-red glow sprinkling on Long Wanqing"s beautiful white face and neck made her as dazzling as the world"s most beautiful gem.
At such a beautiful sight, the nearby Gu Hai was in a slight daze.
Suddenly, Long Wanqing seemed to have sensed something. She turned her head to look, and her eyes just happened to meet directly with Gu Hai"s.
A slight smile immediately bloomed on her lips. That one smile was like a hundred flowers blooming altogether. In that instant, the heart of Gu Hai, which had been frozen for a long time, suddenly started beating with warmth.
Gu Hai"s expression changed. In the blink of an eye, he immediately suppressed that sliver of warmth gus.h.i.+ng out to the bottom of his heart.
"You are out?" Long Wanqing broke into a charming smile.
"Yes! Just studied the True Dragon Golden Core Exercise, and channelled the True Yuan as instructed in it. It is indeed far better than the Golden Stage exercises I had found. It"s extremely grand and filled with vitality, charging straight to the five chakras," Gu Hai stated gratefully.
"Opening the five chakras is the most crucial. The heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys are equivalent to the five opening of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. Opening the five chakras will be extremely beneficial to the Nascent Soul Stage!" Long Wanqing explained.
"Oh?"
"Just like your dantian, where you will congeal a Nascent Soul, you will also have to congeal Nascent Souls in the five chakras!" Long Wanqing explained.
"Nascent Souls will be congealed in five chakras? Wouldn"t that mean that six Nascent Souls will be congealed?" Gu Hai blurted out, perplexed.
Long Wanqing nodded her affirmation. "Yes, those are your corporeal souls! The congealed corporeal souls are your Nascent Souls! They are your source of power!"
"Oh? A human has three ethereal souls and seven corporeal souls, then, why are there only six corporeal souls?" asked Gu Hai, confused.
A furrow crept across Long Wanqing"s brow as she shook her head and replied, " I, too, am not clear. However, the cultivation in the world is just like that. Once you have congealed six corporeal souls, then, you can open the Heavenly Palace and cultivate your three ethereal souls!"
Confusion was clearly apparent in Gu Hai"s eyes. Nonetheless, he nodded to Long Wanqing.
"Right, we are about to arrive at Silvermoon City! It"s one of the major coastal cities of the Ying Province; other members of Ascendant Hall are already waiting there. There is a secondary headquarters that was set up by my mother in the past there, it is the place where my Ascendant Hall is stationed!" Long Wanqing told, gazing into the distance.
"Oh? A secondary headquarters set up by your mother!? Did your mother establish many secondary headquarters?" asked Gu Hai, curious.
"No, there aren"t many, just a total of two places in Ying Province!" Long Wanqing shook her head.
"Oh? Then, why did she choose Silvermoon City!?" Gu Hai asked, burning with curiosity.
"My mother was a zither lover, and Silvermoon City is famous for its zithers! Almost all kinds of zithers in the world can be found there. Also, many zither casters live there!" Long Wanqing explained.
"Is that so?" The confused Gu Hai nodded along as he digested her words.
The flying s.h.i.+p had flown at an astonis.h.i.+ng speed. At that moment, Long Wanqing pointed into the distance, where Gu Hai could clearly see a giant city by the sea.
Much to Gu Hai"s surprise, the sheer size of the city was comparable to almost half of Nine-Five Island!
One must bear it in mind that Nine-Five Island was almost as big as the Earth, Nine-Five Island was like a small planet. And this city was actually half the size of the Earth!?
Don"t ask how Gu Hai measured it, for there were city walls surrounding this city.
Those towering city walls were five hundred zhang high.
[TLN: Five hundred zhang is almost equal to one mile.]
Five hundred zhang, that was equivalent to five hundred story building. There were clouds lingering in the sky above the city, as if they wouldn"t let anyone see what went on inside those walls.
What"s more was that there were countless arrays engraved on those towering walls, s.h.i.+mmering with many dazzling glows.
"This is Silvermoon City. The entire city is an enormous array, it can withstand the attacks of Heavenly Palace experts. It"s very secure!" Long Wanqing explained.
"Also quite vast!" Gu Hai praised, bitterly smiling.
Yes! Fortunately, I came here! No wonder the people of Divine Continent think of the Thousand Islands Seas as backward and primitive.
Just my Great Han Royal Palace is far worse than this.
Just an ordinary city can take down my Great Han Royal Dynasty!
Gu Hai took a deep breath as he continued to stare at the giant city.
The officials brought by Gu Hai also could not help but gasp at this moment.
"Is this an immortal city? So grand!"
"This is just a city!? Just a city!?"
"No wonder His Royal Majesty wanted to use the entire Tiger Cage Pa.s.s as the Royal Palace. Yes, we were too narrow-sighted!"...
The officials of Great Han felt that their eyes weren"t big enough. The sight of various strange and exotic beasts flying above Silvermoon City was no different than a scene from paradise.
The flying s.h.i.+p gradually landed outside the Silvermoon City, at a place which was dedicated to docking the flying s.h.i.+ps.
Just as they docked the flying s.h.i.+p, a group of people came to greet them.
"These are crane carriages. Flying s.h.i.+ps aren"t allowed to fly inside the city, you can"t randomly fly in the public areas even more so. These celestial cranes can carry us through the city very quickly! It"s like your old horse carriages, only, you have to pay!" Long Wanqing explained to Gu Hai.
Gu Hai nodded his acknowledgment. It didn"t matter to him, as he still had some spirit stones.
A team of almost a hundred people, packed inside the crane carriage, flew towards the city entrance.
The city gate was almost a hundred zhang high. Floating above it was the "Silvermoon" word in huge characters.
By the entrance, there was a team of guards. Just as they wanted to check, Long Wanqing took out an Ascendant Hall Token. Immediately after, the entire team was allowed to go in very easily.
Once they entered the city, Gu Hai"s team peered their eyes around. Much to their surprise, there were many islands floating in various places in the sky. There were many pavilions and halls on the floating islands. The whole scene looked particularly beautiful. Of course, many of the islands were shrouded by dense fog. Obviously, they didn"t want to be open to the outside world"s inspection. All kinds of immortal and beautiful birds were flying around the immortal islands. The entire scene looked like something out of a dream.
The team of Great Han officials felt that their eyes weren"t big enough to see. They kept on blinking in a daze.
There were many streets, trailing far into the distance. One could see countless cultivators running about on them.
Long Wanqing was always paying attention to Gu Hai. But after having been slightly surprised at first, Gu Hai soon regained his calm. Only a curious look was present on his face. Generally, anyone who sees this scene for the first time, they would be surprised for a long time, right?
"Is everyone inside the city all cultivators?" Gu Hai asked curiously.
"There are only a few mortals, most are cultivators. The weakest are only in the Houtian Stage. However, they can only live at the bottom. The Xiantian Stage and Golden Core Stage cultivators are the most populous, and then, Nascent Soul cultivators!" Long Wanqing nodded to him.
"What is the population of this city?" Gu Hai asked further.
"One hundred million!" Long Wanqing replied, gazing into the distance.
Gu Hai was rendered speechless.
The Great Han officials were even more shocked; their eyes were about to pop out. One hundred million!? There were a hundred million people residing in a city? At Nine-Five Island, a city with a population of a hundred thousand is considered as a super city!
"Silvermoon City is a bit remote, the population is not much!" Long Wanqing went on, shaking her head.
This casual remark rendered the team of Great Han officials mute once more.
Gu Hai, on the other hand, wasn"t too shocked. After all, it was only four times the population of Shanghai back on Earth. Furthermore, this city was bigger than all of China! In his opinion, one hundred million was nothing!
In an extremely gorgeous hall located inside Silvermoon City...
Young Master An was gently cleaning an ancient zither. Right then, a subordinate rushed into the hall suddenly.
"Young Master An, someone just relayed the news that Long Wanqing and the others have arrived here!" that subordinate reported in an extremely respectful manner.
"Oh? Long Wanqing and her team have also come to Silvermoon City?" Young Master An"s eyebrow twitched momentarily. He immediately stopped cleaning the ancient zither.
"Yes, apart from that Miao Chen, everyone that we saw on the White Cloud has come here!" that subordinate reported respectfully.
A sliver of a cold smile immediately emerged on Young Master An"s face. "It"s indeed true that enemies often cross each other"s paths. How long has it been? They rushed over to here!? Hmph!"
Editor"s Note: We are using chakra in the Western version as "energy points in the body", and ignoring the proper Indian definition of "along the spine", as Ash was very quick to point out.
Before you all run out to do the math in disbelief, yes, that"s averaging 1 person per square mile or so. Just imagine how big the average estate must be… less then a person per skysc.r.a.per...