Chapter 789: Chapter 598 Entering Tao, Spatial Changes_2
Deng Xing sighed inwardly, and could only say: "Your subordinate obeys the command. However, Young Master, to train those young and strong men, we must ensure they can eat meat!"
How could a group of young and strong men, who could barely have enough to eat, be trained to become anything?
To train, they must eat meat.
Yang Mingzhao had a bit of a headache, the Silver he carried with him was not much, altogether just a few hundred taels.
Having spent quite a bit of Silver on the way here, and with more expenses awaiting on the return journey, there was not much Silver left to spend here.
"Lu Bo, you go to the county town as well and find Li Dagui, have him buy some livestock and poultry for the villagers in the valley to raise!"
"How much Silver do we have left?"
Lu Bo said: "We still have one hundred and twenty taels; Li Dagui should have some on his side, too!"
"Keep fifty taels and exchange the rest for livestock and poultry!" Yang Mingzhao ordered.
"Yes!" Lu Bo responded.
Things could only proceed this way for now; it wasn’t that Yang Mingzhao did not want to do other things, but his hands were indeed tied with very little Silver and materials, preventing him from undertaking other tasks.
In the following few days, Deng Xing began training the young and strong men within the fort, while Yang Mingzhao started to plan seriously.
Plan before acting, this was what Yang Mingzhao learned from Yang Zhenshan.
No matter what you do, you have to make a plan first. Perhaps plans can’t keep up with rapid changes, but it’s always much better to follow a plan than to act recklessly.
However, after thinking for a long time, Yang Mingzhao ultimately decided to make a trip back to Star Moon Island first.
There was no choice; his capital at hand was too small. To do something big, he had to rely on the resources of Star Moon Island.
Thus, this time Yang Mingzhao stayed at Three Arrows Valley for only half a month before leaving with Han Lin and Yang Ze, two guards. As for Ma Yan, Lu Bo, Li Dagui, and Deng Xing, the four of them were left behind in Three Arrows Valley.
The three of them traveled light, first heading to Jiujiang Prefecture, then taking a boat from Jiujiang Prefecture along the Song River to head east to Jiangnan, and finally waiting in Jiangnan for the Yang Family Trading Company and Tenglong Guard’s sea vessel to go to Star Moon Island.
...
In the Spiritual Spring Space.
Yang Zhenshan crouched by the pond side, looking at the blooming lotuses with some speechlessness.
Ten years!
A whole ten years!
The unidentified lotuses in the pond were still blooming!
A single lotus bloomed for ten years, which somewhat exasperated Yang Zhenshan.
He had originally thought that in a year or two, these lotuses would bloom and then wither, producing seed pods; but who could have known that ten years would pass and these lotuses still had not produced any seed pods.
"It should be soon, they’ve started dropping petals!"
Yang Zhenshan picked up a pink petal from the water’s surface, bringing it to his nose to smell.
Suddenly, his eyes lit up, and he put the petal into his mouth.
As soon as the petal touched his tongue, instantly a refreshing sweetness pervaded his mouth.
Yang Zhenshan gently chewed, and upon swallowing the petal, he immediately felt a cool breath spread throughout his body, making his consciousness and thoughts incredibly clear.
"What is this?"
Yang Zhenshan was both shocked and delighted.
He felt something unusual, something extremely mysterious.
This feeling was very profound, and it was as if something linked him to heaven and earth.
What could it be?
It was Daoist Intent!
He suddenly looked up towards the sky.
The gray sky trembled, and faintly, there seemed to be stars twinkling.
Yang Zhenshan stared straight up at the heavens, his eyes as brilliant as the stars.
"The natural Dao! Is this the law of heaven and earth?"
A sudden break in the clouds revealed a bright radiance above, it was the sun!
Following that, a gentle breeze swept through, mist rose, and above the nine heavens, the clouds transformed.
The grayish-white clouds obscured the sunlight.
Crack!
Thunder roared, dazzling lightning flashed across, and the pitter-patter of rain began to fall.
"It’s raining!" Yang Zhenshan said excitedly.
This was the first time it had rained in the Spiritual Spring Space.
Before, there was wind and fog in the Spiritual Spring Space, but it had never rained, nor had there ever been a sun.
But today it actually rained!
Had the Spiritual Spring Space evolved again?
The pitter-patter of the light rain made the plants within the space seem even more vibrant, the animals were looking for places to shelter from the rain.
The gentle wind blew again, weaving the rain into a sheet.
"So that’s how it is, that’s how it is, ha ha ha~~"
Yang Zhenshan burst into laughter.
He thought of the lotus flowers in the pond and walked directly into the water, picking up all the petals still floating on the surface and eating them.
With each petal consumed, he could feel strands of profound Daoist Intent emerging in his mind.
The sky continued to tremble, and it seemed as though the earth was also trembling.
The pond was actually expanding silently; no, it should be the entire space that was expanding silently.
A mountain range suddenly appeared to the north, and a cliff abruptly appeared to the south.
The pond transformed into a lake, with the Spiritual Spring hidden beneath the surface of the water, a river extended to the south of the pond, quietly, and without a sound, flowing into a barren land.
To the east, another hill emerged, and to the west, an even higher mountain appeared.
Yang Zhenshan watched the changes around him in astonishment and felt somewhat overwhelmed.
Eventually, his gaze fixed on a tall mountain in the northwest; it was indeed very tall, topped with thick snow.
The clouds dispersed with the wind, and the sun shone brightly.
Yang Zhenshan’s face was full of puzzlement.
Had the space become so large?
He hesitated for a moment, then flew toward the tall mountain in the northwest.
Exiting the orchard, he came across dark soil, and after walking more than ten miles, he arrived at the foot of the mountain.
No, not at the foot, but rather midway up the mountain because there was a very deep ravine below.
His previous spatial boundaries were not on flat ground, but on top of a high mountain!
Looking toward the south, his eyes saw a continuous range of mountains.
Without further hesitation, Yang Zhenshan first climbed the mountain, then flew towards the west.
After flying for more than two hours, he finally saw the familiar misty boundary.
Yang Zhenshan suddenly looked back, gazing at the snow-capped peak, "This must be about a hundred miles!"
After that, he continued to fly along the boundary until the sunset in the west, the rising of the bright moon, and the stars filling the sky; only then did he return to the side of the pond.
No, now it should be called a lake!
The lake remained circular, but its diameter expanded to more than three hundred zhang, which is over a thousand meters.
The Medicinal Field, the orchard, the tea garden, the grassland had all grown substantially.
The courtyard remained, and those Spiritual Fruit Trees were also intact, but the distances between the Spirit Fruit Trees had increased.
Yang Zhenshan squatted on the ground and studied for a long time, finding that all the animals and plants within the space were unharmed, but the surface area of the ground had expanded.
What was originally dense grass and forests had become much sparser.
"How magical the transformation is!"
Yang Zhenshan couldn’t figure out how this change came about and could only marvel at its wondrousness.
The cool moonlight fell, and Yang Zhenshan looked around at the surrounding mountains.
This northwestern peak was the tallest of all; apart from this, there were the peaks under his feet, and then there were many other mountains of various sizes scattered around.
The whole space remained circular, but the diameter must be around two hundred miles; he had no way to measure the exact size.
Between the mountains, there were rocks, fertile land, rivers, waterfalls, and other geographical features that are likely to form, though the river has not yet flowed over them.
At the very least, there should be a larger pool formed under his mountain; as for where the river will go next, it will depend on the terrain’s elevation.
"It shouldn’t be called the Spiritual Spring Space anymore; should it be called the Spiritual Spring Heaven and Earth? The Spiritual Spring World?"
Yang Zhenshan felt it was incredible.
His space had experienced significant changes before, namely when his cultivation reached the Innate Realm, the space had expanded a lot at once, but not as drastically as this time.
As for the reason for the spatial changes, Yang Zhenshan already knew.
It was because his cultivation had once again improved qualitatively.
Entering Tao!
No, to be precise, re-entering Tao.
Over the past ten years, he had actually already grasped Daoist Intent, albeit only a little bit of Martial Arts Dao Intent, but it was genuine Daoist Intent.
Simply put, he had entered Tao a long time ago.
It is the Daoist Intent realized from the technique Thunderbolt Strike.
Yang Zhenshan called it the Way of Martial Arts alone.
It is a type of definitive Daoist Intent, where the person becomes one with the spear; I am the spear, and the spear is me, everything in the world arises because of me.
To put it simply, I am the fundamental essence of this world, the centre of this world; because of my existence, everything in this world exists. If I cease to exist, then everything in this world will disappear.
This is a very extreme Daoist Intent, but it is exactly because of its extremity that the person and the spear merge into one.
From another perspective, it’s more appropriate to say it’s a kind of ultimate Daoist Intent.
The ultimate regarding the spear, the ultimate regarding Martial Arts.
Except for me and Martial Arts, nothing else in this world is important.
Hence, Yang Zhenshan named it the Ultimate Martial Arts, meaning only the Martial Arts matter.