After briefly explaining the function of the Eye of Insight, Yang Hong followed the direction in which Li Ding'an and the others had flown.
Considering that Li Ding'an and the other two were only at the third stage of the Fusion Realm, Yang Hong had not intended to search far. To his surprise, upon leaving the Purple Kun Mountain Range, he discovered that the entire Purple Kun Mountain and the surrounding desert had undergone a drastic transformation.
Following the general direction from memory, Yang Hong returned to the former site of Red Stone Village, only to find no trace of it.
Even the entire Red Stone Gobi Desert had vanished.
Observing the former underground river now a mere stream on the surface, he couldn't help but grumble.
"It's like they've scraped the earth for hundreds of feet."
With the terrain so drastically altered and the nearby mortals extinct, it would take at least a thousand years of migration for the western side of the Purple Kun Mountain Range to prosper again.
Furthermore, migration was contingent on cultivators residing there permanently; otherwise, even after a millennium, humans would never proliferate in this land.
After searching in that direction for another three days without encountering any cultivators, Yang Hong changed course and searched within the Purple Kun Mountain Range for another three days.
The interior of the Purple Kun Mountain Range, with vegetation beginning to grow and the spiritual iron ore from the previous Black Despair, attracted many cultivators who were prospecting in the mountains.
Thus, Yang Hong encountered over a hundred cultivators, mostly at the Foundation Establishment Realm, who were active in the area. Yang Hong directly apprehended a few, interrogated them using soul-confusing techniques, but still found no news of Li Ding'an.
Seeing this, Yang Hong abandoned the search for clues and returned to Clear Wind Mountain.
After all, the two who had pursued Li Ding'an had been utterly annihilated by Yang Hong, making it impossible for them to seek trouble.
As for Li Ding'an, although he had escaped back to the Immortal Realm, only a wisp of his soul had survived. It would likely take him thousands or tens of thousands of years to cultivate back and seek revenge on Yang Hong.
The potential threat had been largely resolved.
...
Upon returning to Clear Wind Mountain, Yang Hong immediately worked with Zhu Yuyan and the others to perfect the array formations across the entire peak.
At an altitude of three thousand feet on the mountainside, a dazzling silver sword light flashed.
Rumble~
With a deafening roar, a sword mark, over 200 feet deep and three feet wide, was deeply etched into the mountainside.
Boom~ Boom~ Rumble~
Following three more booms, the sword mark penetrated another twenty feet.
Then, the silver sword light flared up again. This process repeated, with four flying swords attacking in turns for an hour before stopping.
In an exquisite stone courtyard, Yang Hong and the three women, Zhu Yuyan, slowly descended.
"Husband, we have also cultivated the Great Five Elements True Scripture, and our flying sword magic is not significantly different. Yet, there's a vast gap in our attack power.
Wanwan's attack power is the strongest, Yuzhi is second, and mine is noticeably weaker. However, my spirit root attributes are dual gold and earth, which are considered quite adept at offense.
Does destiny truly determine the direction of development?"
After speaking, Zhu Yuyan, examining the sixth-tier flying swords that proclaimed dual gold and earth attributes, sighed continuously.
Yang Hong frowned and pondered for a moment before saying, "Perhaps the readings of the Dao Heaven Mirror have their rationale. Once the sect's array formations are largely complete, we can go to the eastern side of the Purple Kun Mountain Range to find some mortal cities and recruit disciples. Then we can observe their progress.
This might reveal the accuracy of the Dao Heaven Mirror's detection capabilities and attribute entries."
After more than ten days of targeted testing, it was confirmed that Zhu Yuyan, with her dual gold and earth spirit roots, indeed had weaker combat capabilities than Wanwan, who had dual fire and earth spirit roots, and was even slightly inferior to Song Yuzhi.
However, in terms of cultivation techniques, Zhu Yuyan was significantly stronger than the other two.
Most notably, Zhu Yuyan's array formation proficiency had reached the fourth tier, while Song Yuzhi and Wanwan's array formation skills had remained at the second tier for a long time.
Concurrently, Zhu Yuyan was also skilled in artifact refining and was a fourth-tier array master. Song Yuzhi had good alchemy skills and was a third-tier alchemist. Wanwan, on the other hand, only knew spiritual cuisine and was a second-tier spiritual chef.
Moreover, Wanwan's interest in spiritual cuisine was solely due to her gluttony.
From this, it appeared that the original Dao Heaven Mirror, and now Yang Hong's Eye of Insight, provided quite reliable readings.
"Husband, if we are so eager to recruit disciples, why do we need to hollow out Clear Wind Mountain?"
Song Yuzhi pointed at the sword mark and the cave entrance in the distance, where dust still hadn't settled.
"This is also for the construction and deployment of array formations. I don't want to be forced to flee everywhere the next time Black Despair erupts. I will build some structures within the mountain itself and deploy array formations across the entire Clear Wind Mountain."
"But Black Despair causes spiritual energy to run rampant!"
"That's why I need to hollow out a mountain to set up an isolation array, one that can block out all auras, including spiritual energy."
"Hiss~ Are there such array formations? Will they be difficult?"
"Heh~ Yes, there are. Do you remember the sealed space on the Great Snow Mountain where we were imprisoned? That space used a very advanced isolation restriction. While I can't learn all of its restrictions, I can learn some of its capabilities."
Speaking of the sealed space, a murderous glint flashed in Yang Hong's eyes, and the expressions of the three women also turned somber.
Seeing their moods change again, Yang Hong stood up, clapped his hands, and said,
"Alright, we've rested enough. Let's continue. This time, we won't use sword flight; we'll use spells. Let's test our individual spell affinities, which will be helpful for targeted cultivation later."
"Mmm~"
Occasional sounds of spells being cast echoed from within the massive mountain. Since the goal was to blast through the mountain, Zhu Yuyan and the other two naturally ceased being cautious and unleashed their full power.
A fire dragon led the way, followed by a water dragon that attacked the caves and extinguished fires, and finally, an earth dragon surged out of the cave, carrying large amounts of soil and rocks up the hundred-foot slope, slightly thickening the mountainside.
Yang Hong wasted no resources.
After some testing, Wanwan was most proficient and suited for fire-element offensive spells, while her earth-element defensive spells also performed well.
Song Yuzhi, skilled in alchemy, miraculously excelled in water-element spells.
However, Yang Hong recalled the "Nuclear Bomb True Monarch" from a novel he had read in his past life, so he was teaching her to cultivate both water and fire simultaneously, aiming to combine water dragon spells and fire dragon spells to create a nuclear bomb.
Zhu Yuyan could be said to be not really adept at spells. Although her gold and earth spirit roots were as high as 55 points, her spell performance was truly crushed by Wanwan and Song Yuzhi, whose spirit root attributes were inferior to hers.
Looking at Zhu Yuyan, who was pouting and exhibiting a rare girlish demeanor, Yang Hong gently hugged her and comforted her,
"Don't be sad, you just haven't found the right spells yet. Given your destiny attribute, I think we can have you cultivate Confucian techniques, entering the Dao through literature, and then fighting with poetry and paintings."
"Is there such a cultivation method? Husband, you don't have to lie to comfort me."
Zhu Yuyan became even more dejected. She had also ventured in the cultivation world and, after two hundred years of cultivation, apart from immortals, Buddhas, and demons, she had never heard of a third path of cultivation.
"This should exist. We'll just search carefully.
Furthermore, I have some ideas. If we research further, perhaps we can even create a new path of cultivation."
Yang Hong remained undeterred, as he had numerous Confucian classics from his past life in his mind. Combined with his cultivation knowledge, he might be able to forge a new path of cultivation.
Suddenly, Yang Hong felt an urgent desire to take in disciples.
As for what use disciples would be?
You guess!