Daily life of a cultivation judge

Injuries to the soul usually took a long time to heal, and that was for the lucky ones which even then, wasn't usually achieved through natural recovery. Most injuries to the soul, if not all, required an external impetus, such as a soul-related art capable of aiding the healing process, which would also require the right environment to be effective. If not a soul art, then one would need the hands of a highly skilled healer, or a precious treasure renowned for treating soul-related maladies.

Whether it was a soul-related art, the right environment, a healer, or a rare treasure, all of these options shared one thing in common: quality and rarity.

Take soul arts for example. Any technique with genuine soul-healing properties was at least blue grade. As for the environment, its quality had to be on par with, or greater than what was created by a lesser dragon vein.

These weren't things one could easily come by, nor were they accessible to just anyone. And yet, compared to finding a highly skilled healer or a soul-nurturing treasure, obtaining a blue grade soul art or locating a lesser dragon vein-level environment or its equivalent—difficult as those might be—was still considerably easier.

Just like with cultivation arts, a healer skilled in soul maladies had to be at least a middle-tier to top-tier blue grade healer, but it didn't stop there. Dealing with the soul required more than just technique. It demanded natural intuition as well. Technique alone wasn't enough.

That was why, while every healer capable of treating soul injuries was guaranteed to be a middle-tier to top-tier blue grade healer, not every middle-tier- top-tier healer could handle soul-related issues.

Middle-tier to top-tier blue grade healers were already few in number, but those who could treat the soul were even rarer. Soul-affiliated natural treasures were just as scarce as those healers, if not more so.

Which was why, for most cultivators, losing a limb was preferable to suffering even the smallest nick to their soul.

This was what made cultivators so cautious in matters concerning the soul. Whether victim, culprit, or just an intermediary like a healer—or in Yang Qing's case, an investigator—they would all approach soul-related matters with wariness.

And it wasn't just out of concern for the other party. The danger extended to themselves as well.

To influence or interact with someone's soul required using one's own soul as the medium. And given how delicate the soul was, that wasn't something to take lightly.

This was also why natural ability and intuition were essential traits for anyone seeking to become a healer handling soul-related afflictions.

Cultivators with natural affinities related to the soul could respond to the unexpected and protect themselves in case their soul was targeted while interacting with another person's soul. Yang Qing is one such example.

His powerful soul made him extremely sensitive to any changes concerning the soul, especially when directed at him. That sensitivity was what gave him the confidence to investigate the cicada's soul. But even with that confidence, he didn't dare examine her soul directly.

Given the gap in the strength of their souls, Yang Qing could have simply brute-forced his way in, bypassing the need for a spell. Using just the raw might of his soul, he could have easily invaded and examined her soul.

But he didn't.

Whoever had planted that imprint and rune inside the cicada was clearly someone highly skilled in soul manipulation. After all, pulling off something like that in a creature whose very nature centered around soul strength was no small feat.

If he had recklessly forced his way in, who knew what traps he might have triggered? Which was why a spell was necessary.

Yin Yang Genesis: Yin Star of Illumination not only provided him with a refined and controlled method to investigate the cicada's condition—minimizing the risk of harming her—it also gave him a layer of protection in case there were hidden traps designed to deter and or punish any attempt at spying or tampering.

The webbed sigil, working in concert with the star sigils, formed a protective blanket capable of detecting, containing, and diffusing any attacks that might target Yang Qing. At the same time, it also included mechanisms designed to shield the cicada's soul in case something went wrong.

Cultivators, given the strength of their bodies could brute force their way through things, yet they invented techniques, why? Because techniques allowed them to properly harness and refine that raw power, enabling them to exert greater force and efficiency through control and precision.

It was the same for Yang Qing.

The spell allowed him to channel and maximize his innate attributes, accomplishing far more than he could through raw power alone. That was actually why he chose to use a spell tied to his physique to investigate the cicada's soul.

His purple grade art contained a compendium of high-quality soul techniques—powerful ones, at that—but he still preferred using those rooted in his physique. The reason was simple: they were easier for him to wield. Felt like second nature, even. He didn't need to constantly study or train to improve his mastery of them. He simply knew how to use them effortlessly, like moving a limb.

And when it came to delicate tasks like peering into someone else's soul, that ease, that natural familiarity, was invaluable.

Intuition was the name of the game where the soul was concerned.

Using the spell, Yang Qing carefully scanned the cicada's soul inch by inch as he made his way toward its core. As small as her physical body was, her soul—figuratively speaking—was about the size of a small to medium lake.

Despite its size, and despite Yang Qing's slow and methodical approach, he was still able to cover half of it in just under three minutes. His skills, natural attributes, and cultivation realm made that possible.

Halfway through, he hadn't found any traps hidden within her soul, at least not the kind left behind by another party. However, he did find several safeguards the cicada herself had embedded to protect her soul. He bypassed them with ease, slipping through without triggering a single one.

Eventually, he reached the rune.

As a history and archaeology enthusiast with interests spanning multiple schools of Dao, Yang Qing could spot a few clues at a glance. First, the rune was definitely ancient. Second, from the aura it emitted, it gave off the distinct sensation of being a formation.

And the deeper he peered into it, the more certain he became.

"An entrapment formation… with isolation properties," Yang Qing murmured thoughtfully as he examined the rune further.

He may not have been a master of formation arrays, but years of attempting—and failing miserably—to tamper with the complex formation runes, arrays, and glyphs in his own courtroom had taught him a thing or two on the subject.

As such, he was about eighty percent certain the rune was meant to entrap something while simultaneously isolating senses within a certain radius. He had seen a rune with similar structural strokes in his courtroom before. It wasn't an exact match, but the core segments were definitely alike.

And given how many times he had fallen victim to that formation, it was only natural that he'd recognize it.

Yang Qing paused and tilted his head slightly, as his eyes drifted upward, drowning slowly into deep contemplation.

"It's starting to seem more and more likely… they were snatched right here," he said softly, as his gaze flickered.