When Ling Tian opened his eyes, he found himself in a forest with giant trees. Even if Ling Tian raised his head, he would only see the trees covering the sky, but Ling Tian could hear the sound of a nearby river.
The scent of the place was refreshing, but what shocked Ling Tian was the concentration of spiritual energy here—it was double the concentration outside the realm. Because of this, Ling Tian found many herbs almost everywhere, and what made it even more beautiful was the chirping of birds in the place.
"This place seems like paradise, nothing like the secret realms I used to hear about," Ling Tian thought in awe as he placed the herbs in his spatial bag.
However, he soon contradicted this thought and thought cautiously: "But I shouldn't let my guard down. How could such a perfect place exist?"
After that, Ling Tian began to wander and pick herbs carefully, but what Ling Tian didn't know was that outside the secret realm, after the thousandth person entered, the weather began to change again and became turbulent. Suddenly, a purple lightning bolt struck the secret realm.
This caused it to resume its movement and hurl random lightning everywhere. It began to rotate slightly, then started descending into the Tu Long River.
This greatly shocked the crowd, and many of them were disappointed because they couldn't enter the secret realm.
After a few hours of wandering and harvesting herbs, and of course killing some spiritual beasts
"Fortunately, I reached the second level of Qi Condensation, otherwise we'd be in trouble now," Ling Tian said to Ling Yan as he delivered the killing blow to a fourth-level spiritual beast.
Ling Yan nodded in response and began devouring the spiritual beast, as it was the best way for beast-race to become stronger.
Ling Yan had now reached the third level and was close to the fourth. The reason for this was that Ling Tian had been feeding Ling Yan beasts stronger than him for five whole months, so this transformation was natural.
However, after a while, Ling Yan raised his head, looked toward a certain area, and growled at Ling Tian.
Ling Tian understood that Ling Yan sensed people approaching.
Ling Tian hid with Ling Yan among the trees while thinking: "Ling Yan's keen hearing is truly useful. It's probably at the same level as a seventh-level Qi Condensation cultivator. He's saved me several times during these five months."
After a while, two cultivators appeared before Ling Tian. The one in front was someone he recognized as one of the senior brothers from the Ji Lian Pavilion, but unlike his memory, his appearance was now disheveled with a wound in his stomach, and it seemed his energy was depleted because he stopped fleeing.
The cultivator who appeared to be in better condition stopped, though his skin was yellow, and said mockingly: "Why did you stop? Come on, keep running. I want to see how far you'll get."
"From their auras, it seems the senior brother is at the sixth level, and the one chasing him is at the seventh level of Qi Condensation," Ling Tian thought as he assessed their auras.
The senior brother said while panting with sweat dripping from his forehead: "You truly have no honor, you scoundrel from the Fu clan If I hadn't been exhausted, your sneak attack would never have succeeded."
Ling Tian took out the talisman he had obtained from Li Yi and prepared to help this senior brother, but what he heard next shocked him.
The cultivator from the Fu clan snorted and said angrily: "I have no honor? But the person who sacrificed his junior brothers to obtain the Fire Plum Fruit is the one with honor? You truly disgust me."
When Ling Tian heard this, his hands stopped, and the light in his eyes grew cold. He thought: "He deserves to die for what he did, but the question is should I try to kill that cultivator? It seems his energy is also about to run out."
After some thought, Ling Tian made his decision and thought while looking at them with a greedy gaze: "If I don't try to obtain treasures, it would have been better not to enter the secret realm at all. Also, even if things go wrong, I have the Earth Escape Talisman."
After that, the two began fighting, and it continued for five minutes. During these five minutes, whenever the cultivator from the Ji Lian Pavilion was about to receive a fatal blow, he would produce a treasure from nowhere to save him.
"Damn it, don't waste these things—they're going to become mine," Ling Tian thought angrily as he saw the quantity of life-saving artifacts he possessed.
Finally, the cultivator from the Ji Lian Pavilion was exhausted, and a killing blow was launched by the Fu clan cultivator, who was now also slightly injured and looking very disheveled.
The Fu clan cultivator stepped forward, placed his foot on the Ji Lian Pavilion cultivator's stomach, his sword at his neck, and said with difficulty while panting: "Remember, you scum, you were killed by Fu Zhu."
Just as Fu Zhu finished his words and severed the Ji Lian Pavilion cultivator's neck, at that moment when the blood splattered and Fu Zhu blinked, Ling Tian, who had been waiting for some time, knew this was his opportunity, so he quickly activated the Fire Talisman in his hand.
Fu Zhu, who was very happy that he would obtain the Fire Plum Fruit, hadn't even finished swinging his sword when he began to feel heat from behind.
He was shocked and tried to defend, but it was too late. The strike hit him and sent him flying until he crashed into a distant tree.
Ling Tian didn't come out and continued hiding because he wasn't certain the talisman would truly kill him.
Fu Zhu touched his stomach to find a hole instead of his abdomen, and before he pulled his hand out, blood began gushing onto his hand. Fu Zhu realized this was his end and said weakly: "Who..." and died without even knowing who killed him.
After a while, Ling Tian came out and took Fu Zhu's bag, saying: "I don't hate you. I'm just like you—I want to become stronger." After saying this, he burned his corpse so that beasts wouldn't devour his body, because he didn't truly hate Fu Zhu.
As for the cultivator whom Ling Tian had thought was a kind senior brother, he took his spatial bag after confirming it contained the Fire Plum Fruit, without burning his corpse, because he believed people like him didn't deserve that respect.
After Ling Tian obtained the Fire Plum Fruit, he began searching for a place to refine it for several hours. Finally, at sunset, he found a suitable cave. Using a large rock, he closed the entrance and began calculating what he had harvested.
First, he obtained two peak Tier One swords, six thousand spirit stones— of course most of them from the Ji Lian Pavilion cultivator, which was natural due to him being an alchemist, and alchemists were known for their wealth—and got some herbs, and a few techniques. What shocked him was that he didn't find just one fruit but two, and this made him very happy.
After that, he gave one to Ling Yan and took one for himself.
"Perhaps I'll break through to the third level after devouring this fruit," Ling Tian thought happily while imagining his desired breakthrough.
After calming himself, he sat in the lotus position, devoured the Fire Plum Fruit, and began refining it throughout the night.
After a few hours, Ling Tian digested all the fruit's benefits.
"Unfortunately, I didn't even get close to the peak of the second level," Ling Tian thought sadly after opening his eyes.
However, he was shocked when he saw the aura emanating from Ling Yan, because he had broken through to the fourth level of Qi Condensation.
Ling Yan came to him, raising his head as if showing off.
Ling Tian laughed and forgot his sadness, saying cheerfully: "Well, boy, perhaps your strength will become greater than mine by the time we leave this secret realm."
Ling Yan growled as a sign of affirmation.
"Alright, I need to sleep. I haven't slept since the secret realm opened," Ling Tian said while yawning, then went to sleep.