Volume 1 Volume 6 Chapter 173

Volume 6 Chapter 173: Light to Shine After Darkness

Even though everyone had been exploring the seven islands for a whole day, and it was getting late, they had previously wandered aimlessly in the East Sea with Xu Qingfan for over a year, which should have made them exhausted. However, hearing Bai Yu’s words, everyone’s spirits lifted, as the expectation and sense of accomplishment from personally setting up their home were enough to wash away their fatigue.

Xu Qingfan originally wanted to suggest that everyone rest for a night before setting up the secluded dwelling, but seeing their expressions, he immediately understood their thoughts. He recalled the time when he and Elder Martial Brother were forced to leave their home and how they set up their dwelling at the back of Jiuhua Mountain, which made him smile slightly. He nodded and said, "Alright, let’s start setting up now."

Hearing Xu Qingfan’s words, everyone cheered and rushed towards the largest and most beautiful Tianshu Island. Although the Spirit Qi here was the thinnest among the seven, the group decided to establish their main home here.

After discussing and debating, with Zhang Ningmei and Dongfang Qingling taking the lead, the general shape and layout of everyone’s cave home began to take form in their minds.

After the discussion, everyone gathered materials from the area. Tianshu Island is filled with plants, including strong black bamboo and ancient giant pines, with lush green grass all around. Everyone carefully cut down a lot of black bamboo and three giant pines without damaging the small island’s scenery. Using a yellow bird for transportation, they worked together to clear a large grassy area on the small hill in the middle of Tianshu Island. With old pine wood as the foundation, the black bamboo as the framework, and dried grass as the roof, they built a tall and spacious bamboo house at the top of the hill, about a hundred feet in size. It had three entrances and exits, balancing elegance with an ancient charm, and it added to the beauty of the island, bringing it to life.

This large bamboo house was named "Clear Heart Hall" at Xu Qingfan’s suggestion, meaning to understand one’s own deepest pursuits, a form of self-discipline and a hope for all taoist friends and disciples.

In "Clear Heart Hall," the first room served as a gathering place, beautifully decorated in great detail. Although Xu Qingfan thought there wouldn’t be any guests in the future, he still prepared it at the strong suggestion of Dongfang Qingling and Zhang Ningmei. In this matter, the two women had the final say. To them, without a reception area, how could it be called a home?

The second room was where Xu Qingfan would give teachings to everyone in the future. Currently, Xu Qingfan was mastering both righteous and evil paths, surpassing everyone in skills. As the others sought to improve, they would need Xu Qingfan’s teachings. This room was large and bright, simple yet elegant, and it occupied the most space. Xu Qingfan hung the words "Tranquility Leads to Greatness," which had previously been in his room, on the walls. Little Gray also placed a few grass mats on the floor, the only decorations in the room.

The third room was where Xu Qingfan would privately instruct people, as each individual’s situation was unique, and he needed to teach different methods and abilities accordingly.

Behind "Clear Heart Hall," in a little grove, everyone gathered the most simple and elegant flowers and plants to create a flower garden. A small stream flowed in front, where they built a little bamboo bridge, which added charm to "Clear Heart Hall."

Additionally, they built a water bamboo house where the hill met the lakeshore. It was designed to be simple and elegant. Standing on it, one could feel a refreshing and peaceful breeze, watching the fish below and the unknown birds flying overhead, bringing a sense of tranquility. It was named "Heart Nourishing Pavilion," a place for everyone to relax and unwind.

After finishing all of this, everyone began to build their own houses at various spots around the foot and hillside. Seven bamboo houses of different styles dotted the small hill, complementing the blue sky and green earth, creating a serene scene.

The reason there are seven houses is that only Bai Qingfu, Dongfang Qingling, Wang Zegang, Zhang Ningmei, Bai Yu, Tian Zhenxian, and Tian Zhenling plan to live here. Xu Qingfan, however, does not intend to stay on Tianshu Island; instead, he plans to live on Yuheng Island, which is quiet and cool with few animals. Xu Qingfan wants to completely resolve his body’s various issues in the coming days and prefers not to be disturbed while in seclusion. Yuheng Island is the perfect place for this. However, Ting’er only wishes to stay by Xu Qingfan’s side, so he must take her along, and given Ting’er’s current condition, Xu Qingfan does not dare to let her live alone.

Although everyone built their houses very quickly using magical spells, it still took three to four hours to finish everything, and by the time they were done, it was dark. Yet, everyone remained tireless, releasing various glowing magical powers, making Tianshu Island seem as bright as day.

After arranging their small houses, everyone went to Tianji Island, which is full of wild plants and rich in Spirit Qi, to bring back a large amount of stone materials. They cut them into pieces, then smoothed the hills, laying down stones three feet wide, two feet long, and one foot thick on the ground, establishing several small stone paths between the bamboo houses.

Once all of this was complete, Tianshu Island was finally prepared.

These blue stones and bamboo had been nourished by the rich Spirit Qi for countless years and could be considered treasures. They could even be refined into powerful magic tools. Yet, Xu Qingfan was using them to pave roads and build houses, making him feel like a newly rich person.

Next, everyone tidied up Yuheng Island, where Xu Qingfan would live in the future, and built two bamboo houses for Xu Qingfan and Ting’er, joined by a small stone path and a flower garden.

Additionally, everyone organized Tianxuan Island, which is lush with plants and has an abundance of Spiritual Herbs. This place will be a garden for growing and gathering Spiritual Herbs in the future. To help those herbs grow better, they worked together to pull out many useless weeds and wildflowers, leaving space for the precious Spiritual Herbs to thrive. Looking at the plentiful ginseng, Vermilion Fruit, and He Shou Wu, everyone could imagine the scene of having a lot of rare herbs in the future. It is worth mentioning that during this time, Little Green often rushed in, trying to devour the Spiritual Herbs, but he was stopped by everyone, which took quite some effort.

Although Tianji Island is barren and not a single blade of grass grows, the Spirit Qi there is several times richer than on the other islands. It is filled with precious materials and was chosen by everyone as a place to gather materials for future seclusion and refining. They built several stone houses there, but no one lives there regularly. After all, while the abundant Spirit Qi can speed up cultivation, living there for too long can lead to Qi deviation. Without the Mahayana Stage of cultivation, this place is only suitable for occasional seclusion, and even then, one should not stay for too long.

Besides these four islands finding their purposes, the other three islands—Tianquan, Yaoguang, and Kaiyang—have not yet been assigned tasks. Everyone just built a few stone houses and bamboo cottages on them, unsure of when anyone would live there.

However, Xu Qingfan discovered that the volcano on Tianquan Island seemed to still be active. Although it might not erupt at any moment, it was continuously gathering energy, with endless magma inside and very high temperatures.

Noticing this, Xu Qingfan couldn’t help but think, "If I could control the energy inside this volcano, it would be a great place for crafting tools and alchemy. What a pity that among these reclusive people with me, no one is skilled in this area. Speaking of which, in the islands of Tianxuan and Tianji, those precious materials for alchemy and tool-making would also be hard to use."

After setting up everything on the seven small islands, everyone was tired but filled with excitement. The sense of achievement and joy from arranging their home filled their hearts.

While everyone else’s work was done, Xu Qingfan’s task was just beginning. He still needed to use the unique terrain and shapes of the Fog Spirit Islands to set up several barriers and formations for hiding and protection.

Xu Qingfan started arranging things on the island, then flew outside of the island’s glow. With his hand gestures, he stirred the sea water beneath him. This took a whole day, and as time went on, a large amount of sea mist rose from the water, quickly enveloping the Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands, making it look hazy from a distance.

The formation Xu Qingfan set up was the most advanced illusion array he knew of so far, called the "Nine Disorientation Heaven Array." People outside the array could not see what was happening inside, and once they entered, they would get lost and unknowingly return to where they started. Although it had no attacking power, it was very difficult to break. With Xu Qingfan combining the sea mist and the Spirit Qi of the Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands, its power increased even more.

After setting up the "Nine Disorientation Heaven Array," Xu Qingfan began to lay out the defensive formations. Compared to the "Nine Disorientation Heaven Array," the defensive barriers were easier to set up. The glow outside the seven islands was already a great foundation; with just a little adjustment to its operation and rules, its power could become incredibly strong.

Under Xu Qingfan’s control, the essence of the sun and moon from hundreds of miles around quickly flowed towards the Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands, and some Spirit Qi within the islands was also diverted to supplement the colorful glow around the islands. After receiving a large amount of support, the colorful glow became even more hazy and introverted. Upon closer inspection, these colorful glows transformed into a ninety-nine-layer colorful barrier, seeming to be separate yet perfectly combined, wonderfully mysterious.

After finishing all this, even Xu Qingfan, at the Mahayana Stage of cultivation, felt a wave of fatigue. He turned back and descended onto Tianshu Island, and it had already been three days.

At the same time, he thought to himself, "The maze and defense spells are set up, but I feel like something is still missing. If only I had two array disks to help, the power of these spells could be doubled, but I don’t know how to make array disks…"

While Xu Qingfan was setting up various restrictions, the others quietly waited at the edge of Tianshu Island. When Xu Qingfan returned, he overheard Dongfang Qingling and Zhang Ningmei discussing something. Essentially, they were saying that even though the houses were ready, no one had brought any living supplies, so it might be inconvenient in the future.

Hearing their words and thinking about the volcano on Tianquan Island, as well as the large amount of refining materials on Tianxuan and Tianji Islands that could not be used, and the missing array disks around Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands, he couldn’t help but think, "It seems we are still unprepared for this retreat. We didn’t bring any living supplies, and what about that volcano and refining materials? If only Old Beggar were here, he could use those materials to refine many advanced magic tools and could also make array disks for me…"

"Master! Master! I found something amazing!"

Just as Xu Qingfan was lost in thought, he heard Bai Yu’s loud voice shouting.

Turning around, he saw Bai Yu flying towards him quickly with a yellow bird. It seemed that there was something very large on the back of the yellow bird.

As he got closer, he was shocked to see it was a large piece of yellow jade that contained powerful Spirit Qi. It was about seven feet tall, one foot thick, and three feet wide. The abundant Spirit Qi inside was astonishing, leaving Xu Qingfan both surprised and amazed. The others stared at the jade in awe, unable to speak for a long time.

In the cultivation world, this piece of jade could be described with one term, "priceless treasure"! With such powerful Spirit Qi, it was like a moving spiritual vein. When its Spirit Qi surged, it even echoed with the fluctuations of the five elements of heaven and earth.

Bai Yu excitedly reached Xu Qingfan’s side and said, "Master, I dug this out while collecting stones! And beneath this jade, there’s a spirit stone mine, all high-level spirit stones!"

Xu Qingfan looked at the huge jade stone and suddenly realized what he had missed doing.

Defensive formations like the maze and the protective circle belong to defense; if enemies attacked, there seemed to be a need for a counterattack formation. However, such formations are very difficult to set up, and they have to protect the entire Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands, which made even Xu Qingfan feel helpless.

But with this jade stone, everything was different.

With a wave of his right sleeve, Xu Qingfan put away the jade stone and smiled at everyone, saying, "It’s been a long time, so you must be tired. Go rest, everyone."

After everyone reluctantly left, Xu Qingfan returned to Yuheng Island with Ting’er but handed her over to Zhang Ningmei for care while he went into seclusion with the jade stone.

※※※※

Unexpectedly, this time in seclusion lasted for half a year.

During those six months, everyone became accustomed to life on Rainbow Spirit Island. With the abundant Spirit Qi and various rare treasures, they all improved quite a lot. They just felt puzzled that Xu Qingfan went into seclusion for such a long time right after he had just set everything up.

After six months, Xu Qingfan finally emerged from seclusion quietly, but no one knew he was back.

In the past six months, Xu Qingfan continually refined the large spiritual jade that Bai Yu had found. He not only finally made it his own but also created a strong connection with the Spirit Qi of Rainbow Spirit Island. Whenever he activated it, he could easily gather endless Spirit Qi from the Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands, turning it into a powerful attack against any strong enemy within a hundred miles of Rainbow Spirit Island.

Of course, this spiritual jade has great potential. Xu Qingfan spent six months only using it a little. For countless years, this spiritual jade had stayed around the Spirit vein of Rainbow Spirit Island, closely related to the fluctuations of its Spirit Qi, but it is also the easiest to utilize.

In the future, Xu Qingfan plans to refine it into a powerful top-level treasure that can control the Spirit Qi within the Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands. But for now, limited by time and means, he could only do this.

After finishing his meditation, Xu Qingfan took this spiritual jade and flew to the edge of Tianshu Island—the place where the Spirit vein of Rainbow Spirit Seven Islands is, which is the easiest place to draw out its Spirit Qi—and he planted it in the ground.

It is worth mentioning that after the refinement, a large character resembling "light" appeared on the surface of the spiritual jade.

Looking at the character for "light," which is as big as a person, Xu Qingfan suddenly felt a slight stir in his heart.

Light has two meanings. On one hand, when humans are in darkness, light represents hope, as it can dispel darkness and ease the fear and despair in people’s hearts. On the other hand, when that light finally breaks through the endless darkness and shines upon the earth, it represents rebirth. No matter what has happened in the dark night, everything will begin anew.

"It is time to start anew."

Xu Qingfan withdrew his hand and floated silently in the air, the sea breeze lifting his hair. He calmly gazed at the tall jade monument in front of him, with the elegant character for "light" on it, shining brightly under the endless glow around the island.