Cultivation is just so scientific!

If it weren't for the suppression of a Mid Grade Magical Artifact, he wouldn't have even had a chance to use the Spiritual Thought attack, which deepened his understanding of the impact that the disparity in realms had on combat.

Li Shiming stepped forward to the two corpses and cast the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique", and two soul bodies were absorbed by the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique".

After that, he collected the two corpses and began to clean up the traces of battle within the cave dwelling.

The cave dwelling was protected by a formation and was not damaged; all he needed to do was to retrieve all the ice crystal bullets.

Of course, if the ice crystal bullets were left unchecked, they would slowly melt as the Spiritual Power inside weakened over time.

He checked the cave dwelling again, and inside the storage room, there were no shortage of High-level Grain Avoidance Pills, as well as some healing Elixir Pills.

In the other two rooms, Spirit Gathering Arrays had been set up, and just the cost of these formations was substantial.

It was evident that this stronghold was very important, and he confirmed which power's stronghold it was.

From the style of combat, he recognized that the two Qi Refining Late Stage Cultivators were from the Holy Ice Sect, undoubtedly a consequence of Baili Jin Yan's influence.

Li Shiming didn't touch the Elixir Pills in the storage room, nor did he consider dismantling the formation there.

Before he had devised the "Thousand-Mile Mutual View", he would never let go of everything here, as the materials for setting up the formations were quite valuable.

Now, his fortunes were vastly different. It wasn't that he looked down on the wealth before him, but rather that he had deeper plans.

Li Shiming began setting up traps in the cave dwelling, with the main setup being filling the space beneath the cave dwelling with solid explosives synthesized from nitroglycerin and various chemical substances.

Only with an unrestricted source of raw materials could he create the most powerful explosives from his previous life in this world.

A whole two tons of solid explosives were filled underneath the cave dwelling.

He also installed pinhole surveillance cameras on the walls of the main hall of the cave dwelling.

Due to the nature of the cave dwelling, the signals from the pinhole surveillance cameras were unable to penetrate the thick stone walls.

This issue was easily resolved; he added several formation flags to the dwelling's original formation, enabling it to transmit information outside, enhancing the formation with the capability to pass messages outward.

Similar to the Sect Formation in its effect to communicate information, the setup within the cave dwelling was a super simplified version, able to transmit information from inside of the dwelling to eighty meters outside.

Outside of the formation at the sea bottom, he placed an intermediary receiver and extended the signal from there for a kilometer along the seabed using long cables.

Having finished all preparations, Li Shiming sat in a small hole he had dug in the seabed rocks a kilometer away, clad in a diving suit, staying there.

He decided to wait there for a few days, ready to 'fish' for that Foundation Establishment Cultivator who had left.

Although he himself could not defeat a Foundation Establishment Cultivator, he did not believe that two tons of improved solid explosives wouldn't kill a Foundation Establishment Cultivator confined within a cave dwelling.

If even two tons of explosives couldn't do that, he would certainly not linger another moment, and would turn around and head back to Eagle Beak Island.

If Eagle Beak Island was not safe enough, he would hide at Dui Peak.

Given his identity at Dui Peak, applying for a cave dwelling there was possible.

Li Shiming stayed under the sea, where an oxygen generator in the machinery space was producing oxygen, which was then delivered to his diving suit through a tube.

In theory, he could stay underwater indefinitely with enough oxygen, and when hungry, he could make spirit rice in the machinery space. Experience tales with My Virtual Library Empire

In practice, methods from the Cultivation World could also allow him to stay at the bottom of the sea freely, but considering that would generate Spiritual Power fluctuations, he still trusted in technological methods.

Methods of the Cultivation World were designed to detect Spiritual Power fluctuations, while the probing of mundane objects was much more deficient.

As he stayed idle at the bottom of the sea, he contemplated the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique".

This time, having collected the souls of two late-stage Qi Refining Cultivators from the Holy Ice Sect, he had good practice material for the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique".

The souls of late-stage Qi Refining Cultivators were the best soul material he could currently access.

"Spirit Control" involved controlling souls, but the soul here did not refer to a single soul; rather, it was about generating souls through the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique".

The raw materials were the collected souls, which could be from Cultivators or spirit beasts. The souls of ordinary beings were too weak to be used as material for the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique".

Li Shiming used the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique" to begin fusing the two late-stage Qi Refinement souls he had gathered.

The soul was a very elusive substance, only truly perceivable through soul-specific secret techniques like the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique" or using specialized magic artifacts; otherwise, Cultivators would find it very difficult to sense its existence.

The soul of a deceased being bore no relation to its previous life; it was merely a conglomeration of spirit energy, lacking any of the original consciousness or thoughts.

Li Shiming did not know how the souls of high-level Cultivators would behave, but the two souls he collected were very normal and, following the method of the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique", were merged into a primary soul.

This primary soul had a relatively solid energy body, appearing as an energy cluster within his Spiritual Thought.

It was because he had collected the souls of two late-stage Qi Refining Cultivators that he could meet the minimum standard for using the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique"; otherwise, he would have needed to let this primary soul continuously devour more souls of living beings to perform the subsequent Soul Splitting Technique.

The greatest benefit of the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique" was reconnaissance; by splitting off an extremely weak energy form from the primary soul to create a separate soul, this soul could travel millions of miles away from the primary soul and, as long as it wasn't annihilated or its internal energy dispersed, could continue surveilling indefinitely.

When it came to reconnaissance, it had to possess the ability to relay information.

The strength of the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique" lay in the split souls ability to share vision and hearing with the primary soul, and the owner of the primary soul could share the primary soul's vision and hearing.

In this way, no matter how far the split soul traveled from the primary soul, the master could share the sight and sound it experienced.

The split soul was extremely weak, leaving it virtually defenseless. Yet the way the split soul existed made it a threat that very few beings could perceive, let alone detect.

And because of the split soul's weakness, even if it were discovered by a powerful Cultivator, they would likely ignore its presence to a large extent.

This demonstrated the preciousness of the "Spirit Control Soul Splitting Technique"; any one of the three Jade Scrolls kept by Baili Jin Yan, who was worthy to collect them, would be a top-tier Cultivation Technique.

Li Shiming carefully split a separate soul from the primary soul. The split soul was weak, and if it weren't for the primary soul's sensation, he would have struggled to detect the split soul that was almost within reach.

Especially in seawater, the presence of the split soul was even less noticeable.

"It seems that a part of the surveillance work can be done by the split soul from now on!" he thought to himself.

The split soul navigated through the sea, its energy body's flight unaffected by material, facing no resistance from the water.

Through sharing sense with the primary soul, Li Shiming watched as the split soul before him moved through the water with ignorant fish swimming past it.

The split soul reached the ocean's surface and, through shared vision, he saw the sky and the distant silhouette of a small island.

He did not let the split soul leave the water but let it float on the surface, monitoring the direction of the island for him.

In this way, he had two perspectives to observe the island, one from the split soul and the other from the peephole surveillance within his cave dwelling.

He estimated the split soul's condition; it could sustain itself for about ten days.

Without replenishing the soul, the primary soul would not be able to split off another separate soul after this one.

Li Shiming could not help but think that Baili Jin Yan must have had a primary soul of extremely high energy intensity by his side. Unfortunately, the soul body that was the primary soul was completely eradicated by the sudden explosion.

Due to his sudden departure, Yin Shilan and Ren Fei'er were unable to contact him through the Identity Jade Disc over the next two days.

Yin Shilan went directly to Eagle Beak Island, where she found that the small Mountain Protection Array was operating normally. In her mind, Li Shiming was likely to have entered a state of enlightenment or seclusion. Feeling that Li Shiming was not in any trouble, she also felt at ease.

Ren Fei'er, who had traveled with Li Shiming, was convinced that he had not run into any trouble. She was busy calculating how many stories Li Shiming owed her, planning to settle accounts with him once they could make contact again.