The disorientation from the time shift left
Sitting in quiet cultivation, the years had flown by in the blink of an eye, but over twenty years was still an awfully long time. It was as though he'd been ripped out of an endless dream and dropped straight back into reality.
Pure meditation cultivation alone was painfully slow—much slower than his usual training—but the sheer length of time made up for it. Still, once he reached this kind of major breakthrough plateau, grinding it out through meditation alone wouldn't cut it.
He wasn't far from the Heavenly Turning Realm. All he needed was a catalyst, and he could break through!
While Nie Li was stabilizing his cultivation, he turned to
"Did I disturb you?" Xiao Yu asked apologetically. She'd called his name several times already.
"Not at all!" Nie Li waved dismissively.
At that moment, deep within the Illusionary Spirit Palace, a wisp of consciousness was observing Nie Li.
"This kid's got the Myriad Miles River and Mountain Map—he's practically a looter, stripping this Illusionary Spirit Palace bare. He even took the Illusionary Spirit Formation! I thought the secrets in my Illusionary Spirit Palace were impressive enough. Turns out this kid is hiding an even more staggering secret!" the consciousness murmured, then let out an eerie chuckle. "I'm curious to see what you'll do once you open the palace!"
The wisp of consciousness vanished in a flash.
Nie Li seemed to sense something and gazed toward the Illusionary Spirit Palace. Having condensed nine Fate Stars, his perception had sharpened considerably beyond what it was before.
He didn't know exactly what that thing was, but he could be sure it wasn't a living being. Otherwise, it wouldn't have tried to seize his body.
A consciousness from the Illusionary Spirit Palace?
Quite the interesting thing!
Nie Li understood that trying to open the sprawling palace complex spread across several thousand meters ahead would be extremely difficult for him right now. So he didn't even attempt it—but it wouldn't be long before he could!
As long as he was inside the Myriad Miles River and Mountain Map, he wasn't worried about that entity going anywhere!
Even with nine Fate Stars condensed, in terms of actual combat strength, he was still far from enough.
He'd hide out in the Myriad Miles River and Mountain Map for another ten days or so. By then, the people from the Profound Nether Divine Lord's faction would almost certainly have withdrawn. That was when he could leave.
Nie Li surveyed his surroundings, then darted through the space inside the Myriad Miles River and Mountain Map, landing atop one of the spirit pools. With a sweep of his right hand, he collected every spirit stone within it.
These spirit pools had been nourished inside the Myriad Miles River and Mountain Map for ages. Now it was finally time to harvest.
A single pool yielded over three hundred thousand spirit stones, plus more than five hundred spirit stone essences.
After storing all of them, Nie Li shot off toward the second pool.
He swept through all fifty-plus pools, collecting every spirit stone and essence.
A rough count put the spirit stones at over twenty million, along with more than thirty thousand spirit stone essences. That was an absolutely staggering fortune. Nie Li figured his wealth might now rival half of the Feather God Sect!