Chapter 140: Origin of the Grotto-heavens

Chen Jingzhai got up in astonishment.

He wrote his entire Foundation Establishment passage while he was inspired by the Emperor Dragon Qi.

Through spiritualizing one’s acupoints, one could enlighten their flesh and evolve a universe within their body.

The universe in their bodies would consist of Heaven and the Underworld. Various deities would be born from each other and build off each other to achieve enlightenment.

From his perspective, this was the path most suitable for him.

He had the Dragon and Phoenix Consummation Seal Script and could transform all the acupoints around his body.

Aside from acupoints along his meridians, there were also acupoints on his bones and flesh.

Those on his bones were easy to understand. Those on his flesh referred to blood sacs and lymph nodes.

It could be said that 129,600 seal characters covered his entire body.

From the top of his head downwards, every inch of his body was covered in seal characters.

It was apparent that attempting to transform them into spirit deities would be difficult.

Even if he used Essence Power Pearls, they would only be a drop in a bucket. He needed to consume divine treasures.

This would require a massive amount of resources. If other cultivators were to attempt to do so, they would have despaired long ago.

Chen Jingzhai did not even know how he had managed to succeed.

The amount of essence power required for the spiritualization of 36 official deities covering his head to his core was astronomical, especially for the Supreme Sky Master in Heaven and the Core Master of Reincarnation in the Underworld.

Without enough essence power, he would not have been able to spiritualize them at all.

“Could it be because of the divine stone?” Chen Jingzhai had a sudden thought.

His divine mind then swiftly locked onto the divine stone’s location.

Just as he was preparing to enter the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens, his Sky Master suddenly moved.

It rose from its throne and merged with Chen Jingzhai’s divine mind.

It moved with surprising steps as it directly entered into the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens.

As they entered the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens, Chen Jingzhai was immediately overwhelmed with information.

Miraculously, he was not significantly affected even though there was a lot of information.

“So that’s what it is,” he softly mumbled to himself.

After the third mark appeared on the divine stone, he had successfully made the divine stone recognize him as its master.

Aside from being able to open up the divine stone space, the divine stone itself was somewhat miraculous.

For instance, it could coalesce the Innate Qi of the five elements.

Chen Jingzhai understood that this property had been transferred into the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens.

It could also calm his soul and strengthen his mind.

When Chen Jingzhai cultivated this time, the divine stone emitted an innate aura.

It was just a sliver, but anymore, and Chen Jingzhai would not be able to withstand it.

The origins of the divine stone were mysterious. Chen Jingzhai could not make head or tail of it. However, it was definitely more than a Grade 6 treasure.

Even its innate aura was sufficient for him to benefit greatly.

The most visible benefit he had gained was the ability to successfully spiritualize two powerful spirit deities.

Chen Jingzhai’s connection with the distant Grotto-heavens also became more intimate.

He could let the spirit deities permanently reside in the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens in the future.

They could rule over his man-made spirit deities, help him be more compatible with the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens, and improve his comprehension.

Chen Jingzhai could also utilize some of the Origin Power of the primordial essence divine stone.

It was equivalent to him reaching a certain threshold and being granted the authority to do something.

After digesting this news, the corners of Chen Jingzhai’s mouth curled into a smile.

“Let there be sky!” He declared in a loud voice.

Inside the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens, the weather immediately changed. The Origin Power flowed and naturally formed clouds.

The white clouds floated and coalesced, becoming as large as a mountain.

From afar, they appeared like cotton candy. But, up close, they were like swan down.

Chen Jingzhai flew up and stepped into the clouds. It felt as though he was standing on solid ground.

“I still control too little Origin Power. Yet alone from the heavens, I cannot even coalesce clouds. However, that does not matter. I was only giving it a shot,” said Chen Jingzhai with a grin as he walked on the clouds.

Origin Power was the core of the Grotto-heavens and the foundation for its existence.

In theory, he could use this Origin Power to create anything in the Grotto-heavens.

However, he controlled too little of it. He could also only use it here in the Grotto-heavens.

After this attempt, he at least knew what he could do.

A thought suddenly emerged. The trees and stones in the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens flew upward.

Under the effects of his will, they naturally broke down and reshaped themselves. Then, they rapidly formed palaces and pagodas.

Compared to coalescing the heavens, constructing something with will like this was extremely easy.

Chen Jingzhai made 13 palaces in the clouds. His Sky Master spirit deity resided in one of them.

He gave the other palaces to his man-made Grade 3 spirit deities.

All his spirit deities had their own territory and did not need to live together in the mountains.

After Chen Jingzhai finished making all these arrangements, the figure of his Sky Master did not leave and instead protected the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens.

Chen Jingzhai left the Primordial Essence Grotto-heavens and awakened.

“Miraculous,” he stated in amazement. “My spirit deities are all part of me. However, if I do not intervene in their growth, they will have different character developments.”

The five-element spirit deities most vividly demonstrated different personalities.

They represented the seven emotions and six desires.

Even if Chen Jingzhai did not actively cultivate the five-element spirit deities, they could still rely on the power generated by his emotions to evolve.

If he remembered correctly, some extreme methods were used to cultivate one’s emotions among the 300 jade slips sent by Commandery Prince Hong Yi.

Chen Jingzhai had perfectly merged those methods into his Foundation Establishment passage.

This was also a positive effect of his acupoints turning into spirit deities and gaining sentience.

Chen Jingzhai could also rely on the five-element spirit deities to control his seven emotions and six desires.

This would bring forth great benefits when he was cultivating and comprehending the path.

Moreover, the spirit deities were his avatars.

Therefore, as time passed, he would be able to have greater control over them without the divine mind as a medium.

The spiritualization of the acupoints into spirit deities was closely connected to the divine mind. The divine mind guided the seal characters.

However, the might of the seal characters was too overpowering as his divine mind was too weak.

After his body was used to host the spirit deities, they would merge naturally.

In the end, the spirit deities would feed back to the divine mind and help it to grow.

Chen Jingzhai would have a total of 129,600 spirit deities, which was equivalent to owning 129,600 avatars in different shapes and sizes.

He felt great after figuring out everything new about his body.

For now, he did not want to think about ways to harness more fuel for cultivation. Instead, he emerged from seclusion right away.

He was welcomed by the two Sky Black Crane chicks, which had grown to the height of adult humans.

The two chicks reaped great benefits from this swirling funnel incident.

Not only were they fully fluffed up, but they could also fly skillfully now.

Their speed of growth surpassed that of many cubs and chicks of spiritual beasts.

However, it was nothing surprising since they were never short of Spirit Beast Elixirs.

They had extraordinary talents to begin with. With the help of various resources and the fateful encounter of this swirling funnel incident, they successfully achieved a breakthrough.

The two chicks were very happy to see Chen Jingzhai. They flapped their wings in joy as they approached him.

He beamed from ear to ear as he hugged them by their necks and played with them.

He named them Qingfeng and Mingyue.

His naming convention had attracted the bizarre gazes of many others. Even Hong Fu advised him to rename the cranes something else.

After all, Qingfeng and Mingyue could very likely be the appellations of some ancient sages. Therefore, using their titles as names for some beasts would be disrespectful.

However, Chen Jingzhai paid no heed to the others. He insisted on naming the beasts Qingfeng and Mingyue.

Therefore, his four maidservants had been calling the cranes “little cranes” and not their names.

While he was playing with the chicks, Hong Xiu dashed up to where he was upon hearing the commotion.

After that, everyone knew that Chen Jingzhai had emerged from seclusion.

After catching up with everything that had transpired, Chen Jingzhai did not mind that Zhang Kui had gone to Dongyang County.

This was originally what they had discussed beforehand. So there was no issue with the latter acting ahead of schedule.

Chen Jingzhai was somewhat embarrassed for having triggered a gigantic swirling funnel during his seclusion.

He never imagined that there would be such events, let alone that Commandery Prince Hong Yi would bear the loss.

As he had speculated, it would have been impossible to satisfy the needs of the official deities in his body with just the divine stone.

Aside from everyone contributing, it turned out they had also utilized the Essence-Gathering Formation in Donglai City to draw in the ocean’s essence power.

That made sense. A lot of resources were needed for the cultivation of his Foundation Establishment passage.

When Chen Jingzhai thought of this, he became slightly depressed.

Since his temperament had changed, he looked like a melancholy prince instead.

Sage Qing Mu paid no attention to his sadness. Instead, he held Chen Jingzhai by his hand and was excited to exchange pointers with him.

When he saw Chen Jingzhai’s confused expression, he explained how a great aura was triggered while the latter was in seclusion and how the rest of them had benefited greatly from the incident.

Chen Jingzhai revealed a pensive look after listening to Sage Qing Mu’s explanation. Then, he shook his head wryly.

That was the feedback from the divine stone. He could not utilize it as he pleased.

He could only explain to Sage Qing Mu that he himself was unclear about how this had happened.

Although Sage Qing Mu was somewhat disappointed, he did not mind.

He believed that by being around Chen Jingzhai, he would have the opportunity to have a breakthrough.

Since such an aura had appeared once before, there would undoubtedly be a second time.

Just as they were chatting, Hong Yu came up to report that Wang Tong had brought over the butler of Commandery Prince Hong Yi.