Chapter 367: IQ Problem
More than a hundred miles from the center of the Land of Fiery Flames, with Lu Ye's current speed of weapon control, he arrived in less than one incense stick's time.
In the very center, there was a gigantic pit, from which the high temperature caused the surrounding space to become distorted.
Lu Ye circled around the entrance of the cavern with his spiritual artifact, peering inside for a while; he could vaguely make out a group of raging flames at the bottom of the pit.
The female demon had been right, there truly was a group of fire here, but the power of this one was incredibly extraordinary, as if it could even burn through the earth.
No one had ever known what the center of the Land of Fiery Flames looked like.
The cultivators active on the Spirit Stream battlefield were merely at the Spirit Stream Realm level; even powerhouses like Feng Yuechan and Li Baxian could not possibly safely reach this place.
Such Overlord existences as the female demon could only stay more than a hundred miles away.
Had it not been for the power of the Talent Tree, Lu Ye would certainly not have been able to come here.
His head felt somewhat groggy, which was a sign of excessive consumption of mental power, a sensation he had experienced many times while challenging the Hundred Arrays Pagoda.
Taking out the last half bottle of Soul Cleansing Water, he consumed one drop, and the fatigue on his mind rapidly dissipated.
He could tarry no longer; cracking sounds emanated from the spirit ark under his feet, as if even this Spiritual Artifact could not withstand the erosion of the high temperature.
Urging the spirit ark forward, he flew down into the huge pit, plummeting several miles before finally reaching the bottom.
After stowing away the spirit ark, Lu Ye looked towards the group of flames ahead, marveling in his heart.
There was a circle of fire about the size of a washbasin, presenting a noble and pure orange-red color, exuding not only a wild destructive power but also an indescribable sense of vitality.
Lu Ye did not know what kind of fire this was, and he had no interest in exploring further; he had come here to have the Talent Tree devour these flames.
Within the Root Spiritual Orifice, the Talent Tree became noticeably more active; if one were to enable the Insight Spirit Runes, one could even see that the roots of the Talent Tree covering Lu Ye's body surface were constantly twisting and extending, seemingly wanting to plunge into these flames.
Never before had the Talent Tree sent him such a strong message of desire.
Lu Ye reached out towards the orange-red flames; covered by the roots of the Talent Tree, he did not feel too much searing heat.
On internal inspection, he saw a continuous flow of orange-red energy being absorbed through the roots of the Talent Tree, pouring into the trunk.
Lu Ye focused his attention on the leaves of the Talent Tree, curious to see how many leaves would ignite if the Talent Tree devoured this fire.
A strange scene unfolded; the orange-red power flowed through the trunk, but instead of methodically igniting the nearest leaf, it bypassed many unignited leaves and reached the upper part of the trunk.
In an instant, a large number of leaves lit up, no less than a couple hundred of them.
Lu Ye was taken aback.
This was an unprecedented occurrence; previously, when he urged the Talent Tree to absorb the Earth's Core Fire, the leaves on the tree would ignite one by one, and the next ones would respond in turn.
Never before had he experienced such a reaction where one or two hundred leaves responded all at once.
He wondered if it could be due to the extraordinary strength of this fire?
But soon he realized something was off; the unknown fire was indeed strong, otherwise it wouldn't have caused the environment within thousands of miles of the Land of Fiery Flames to become so harsh. However, those reacting leaves were not igniting, they just lit up their patterns. Find your next adventure on My Virtual Library Empire
As the Talent Tree continued to devour the power of the flames, the shining leaves became brighter and more dazzling.
Until at a certain moment, those many leaves burst into vigorous flames.
Unlike the other leaves of the Talent Tree, these leaves burned with an orange-red flame, indistinguishable from the devoured flames.
And Lu Ye had the faint feeling that the coalesced flames seemed to sketch out a mysterious pattern.
At first glance, it looked like a bird engulfed in flames squatting on the Talent Tree, with the flickering flames evolving the bird's lifelike movements.
Its appearance bore a striking resemblance to the Vermillion Bird of the Four Auspicious Sacred Beasts, its long tail feathers trailing behind, exquisitely beautiful.
Lu Ye could not determine if this was a mere coincidence.
Not in a hurry to investigate what spirit runes the leaves might contain, with so many ignited leaves this time, he could slowly investigate when he had the time.
The orange-red flames that had been there before had now vanished, completely devoured by the Talent Tree, and only then did Lu Ye let go of his tightly wound mental state.
Urging the Talent Tree had been relentless, and holding on until now was an accomplishment.
Just as he was about to leave, the sound of something tearing through the air came from above; a figure fell directly not far in front of him.
The figure was slender and graceful, with a prominently rounded chest, and its crimson eyes in this dim pit were like two drifting spectral fires.
Lu Ye's expression tightened as he laid his hand on the Boulder Mountain Saber.
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The underground cavern was not small, but it definitely wasn't large, and the surrounding rock walls had become glazed due to the constant high temperatures year-round.
Confronting a lord-level existence in such an environment was evidently unwise.
With a heavy heart, he focused solely on devouring the ball of fire, forgetting that without the fire's suppression, the one before him could come over on her own.
She had stayed over a hundred miles away before because it was hard for her to endure the pressure any closer, but now that the fire was gone, naturally, so was the pressure.
Her crimson eyes glanced around, "Where's the thing?" She hadn't realized that Lu Ye had never actually agreed to anything.
"Haven't seen it." Lu Ye's fingers rubbed the hilt of his saber, his eyes grazing over the opponent's slender neck, pondering whether launching a surprise attack and decapitating her would likely kill her. In the end, he realized that if he did take the initiative, he probably wouldn't end up with anything good.
"Impossible." The female demon shook her head, "I sensed it before."
"Why don't you look for it yourself?"
The demon didn't speak, instead bending down to search, her claws dancing rapidly, immediately shattering the crystallized ground, and in an instant, dust flew everywhere.
"Let's take off first!" said Lu Ye as he summoned his spirit ark.
At the same time, he kept an eye on the female demon out of the corner of his eye, guarding against the possibility of her suddenly attacking him.
To Lu Ye's surprise, she was so fixated on finding the ball of fire that no longer existed that she had no time to pay him any attention.
This female demon… strong as she is, seems to have some issues with intelligence; she probably couldn't imagine that there would be someone in this world capable of devouring such a powerful ball of flames.
Recalling past encounters, Lu Ye was gradually convinced of this. Her fight with him seemed more like beast-like instinct rather than true hostility.
The spirit ark soared into the sky, and the female demon, seemingly oblivious, continued to furiously dig at the ground.
Only after digging for a long time and finding nothing did she belatedly realize something was amiss.
She tilted her head in thought for a moment, then feathers grew on her arms, and in the blink of an eye, her arms turned into wings. With a flap of her wings, she shot up into the sky, emerging from the pit and looking around, clearly trying to locate Lu Ye.
But having delayed for so long, how could she find Lu Ye?
At that moment, Lu Ye, maintaining the Move-Like-The-Wind Spirit Runes on his spirit ark, was flying like the wind.
The demon's intelligence might be lacking, but no one should expect her to be completely foolish. Having narrowly escaped the jaws of death, the natural thing to do was to flee quickly.
After flying straight ahead for most of the day and exhausting too much spirit force, Lu Ye finally landed and found a place to rest in the forest. He summoned array banners and set up several connected formations around him before he finally felt a bit secure.
Previously, without the skill of setting up arrays, he often had to rely on Yiyi to keep watch when resting in the wild, but now that was no longer necessary. With some proficiency in the Array Path, he could easily set up simple warning, concealment, and protective formations with the help of array banners.
Thinking about his experiences during this period: first, he was hunted by a group of cultivators from Ten Thousand Demons Ridge, then chased by a swarm of demon bees, and finally, driven to the Land of Fiery Flames where he used the environment to shake off the bees, only to encounter a lord-level being…
Life had truly been full of thrills.
He took out several elixir pills, swallowed them to calm his nerves, activated Bestial Gluttony Feast, a humming began in his belly, the effects of the pills quickly dispersed, and his depleted spirit force began to replenish gradually.
First, Lu Ye contacted Yiyi to ensure they were safe, then turned his attention to the Talent Tree.
This time, the Talent Tree lit up more than a hundred leaves; the gains could be called tremendous, and he had no idea which spirit runes were carried on so many leaves.
He didn't rush to explore it, figuring it was not too late to look after he had recovered.
Lu Ye then turned his attention to a storage sack, which held all the good things he had scavenged from that giant beehive.
There were about a thousand jin of fine honey alone, which he had tried while on the run; its effects on physical recovery were particularly remarkable, and it replenished spirit force quite quickly, though not as fast as Breath Fruit wine, and was less convenient than consuming elixir pills.
Perhaps it had other effects as well, which could be thoroughly researched by Second Senior Sister once he brought it back; there might be some unexpected discoveries.
Besides the honey, there was the half-bowl of royal jelly.
Lu Ye hadn't yet tasted the jelly to know its effects.
He strongly suspected that the demon bees' relentless pursuit was not just because he had stolen their honey; the most likely reason was this half-bowl of royal jelly!
From such a large beehive, with so many bee demons, only this small amount of royal jelly was produced; its preciousness could be imagined.
If it weren't for Lu Ye's Concealment Spirit Runes, even a 9th Heaven-level ghost cultivator might not have been able to succeed.
He took out an empty jade vial, filled it with royal jelly, and drank it down, sweetly coating his mouth…
Depleted spirit force and physical strength were quickly restored, much faster than with the fine honey, and then there didn't seem to be any other particular effects.
Lu Ye silently sensed for a while and soon noticed something was off. An indescribable energy began to circulate through his limbs and bones, making his flesh quiver and become denser, blood Qi circulated faster, and even the flow of spirit force inexplicably sped up a bit.
The royal jelly seemed to have a significant enhancement on the circulation of blood Qi and spirit force!
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