Humanity’s Great Sage

The senior brother, still with his grave and stern expression, talked endlessly. His topics were all geared towards familiarizing Lu Ye with the goings on of the Green Jade Gate. It took a few moments before the conversation changed: “In your five elements, fire dominates. I remember that our sect has the Great Flame Burning Desolation Secret Art. It is very suitable for you. Of course, you can also develop in the metal direction. There are also many metal secret arts in the sect. Moreover, if you enter my Green Jade Gate, even as a trial disciple you would be given two Spirit Gathering pills per month. If you can pass the assessment and become a formal disciple, the amount you’d be given would double, would you bear this in mind?”

Lu Ye nodded quickly: “I will.”

But he was also puzzled, ‘What does this mean? Why does it sound like senior brother San is soliciting himself and his sect?’ From senior brother San’s attitude towards him, Lu Ye felt that a cultivator with an opened aperture must have quite an advantage in these assessments.

Lu Ye was secretly proud of himself for opening his Source Aperture.

Senior brother San spoke up again: “Just remember, sit still and stay calm and attentive. You may feel some pain later, but don’t worry, this is just part of the process of testing your talent. Lastly, don’t urge your spiritual power to resist.”

“Yes!” Lu Ye responded, putting his hands on his knees, palms face up, and closed his eyes.

The next moment, he felt a movement of spiritual power. Although he was curious about what senior brother San was doing, it was not appropriate for him to open his eyes to see. When the spiritual power surged, there was a slight vibration under his butt. Lu Ye guessed that it was an effect of the formation on the disc being activated.

Just as he had thought, at this time senior brother San put eight silkworm cocoon-sized crystals into the eight pits on the edge of the disc. These were spirit stones that were commonly used by cultivators to arrange formations and they were things Lu Ye had never seen before.

When senior brother San urged the disc’s formation, the spirit stones in the eight pits emitted a faint mist. This was a mist of pure spiritual power that came from the spiritual power stored in the spirit stones being transformed by the formation.

The rich spiritual power quickly filled the space enclosed by the disc, but there seemed to be an invisible barrier around the disc, trapping the spiritual power inside.

As he sat upright on the disc, Lu Ye’s heart stirred. Although he had his eyes closed, he could feel that there were many wonderful things around him. These things were entering into his body and made him experience a sensation of extreme comfort.

‘Is this spiritual power?’ he thought.

Lu Ye immediately reacted. Breathing in heaven and earth’s spiritual power was one of the main methods for cultivators to practice their cultivation. Lu Ye had tried it when he was in the mine before, but perhaps because of the terrain, he did not feel the spiritual power in the mine. Instead, he could only choose the method of refining his own qi and blood energy to practice.

After being taken out of the mine by Elder Tang, he had forgotten to try to perceive the spiritual power naturally found throughout heaven and earth.

But at this moment, he directly felt the existence of something like spiritual power.

But remembering the previous instructions of senior brother San, he resisted the temptation and did not cultivate with it.

Opposite him, senior brother San performed a kind of plucking technique with his hands, constantly urging the power of the formation, while staring at the small saplings at the edge of the disc.

The formation on the disc was specially used to detect the level of talent. When senior brother San activated the power of the formation, the eight spirit stones inlaid on the disc would release the stored spiritual power and turn it into a mist of rich, pure spiritual power.

Through his actions, these spiritual energies would be introduced into the test taker, and then flow into the formation of the disc. As a result, the small saplings at the edge of the formation would undergo some changes.

In short, the body of Lu Ye sitting on the disc at this moment is a transfer station, and the spiritual power would be transferred to the formation through his body, and then the eight young saplings would undergo certain changes.

The more small saplings that changed, the higher the talent of the test taker and vice-versa.

At its root, this kind of test was to see whether the spiritual power introduced into a cultivator’s body flowed smoothly and unimpeded. The smoother it flowed, the more suitable for cultivation and the higher the talent.

Since the fundamental idea of a cultivator’s practice was to strengthen their own spiritual power, if spiritual power did not circulate smoothly through their body, how would they be able to cultivate?

Next to the disc’s formation, senior brother San continued his actions. But the eight young saplings remained unchanged. His brows wrinkled slightly, and he increased the power of the formation.

Lu Ye frowned suddenly, because he felt a faint tingling in his body. It was as if a lot of external spiritual power was burrowing into his body, making him feel like he was being pierced by countless needles. As time went on, the pain was becoming more and more apparent to him.

It wasn’t until he was about to be unable to endure that the tingling sensation all over his body suddenly disappeared. At the same time as it went away, he heard senior brother San’s voice in his ears say: “Alright.”

Lu Ye quickly opened his eyes, took a long breath, and met senior brother San’s gaze. He found that senior brother San was looking at him with a very complicated expression.

His heart raced as he sensed that this was not an encouraging turn of events.

“Dare to ask senior brother, what is my talent?” Lu Ye asked.

Senior brother San didn’t say a word, only glanced at the disc, stretched out his hand with Lu Ye’s jade card, and handed it back to him.

Lu Ye took it, and found that on the side his alignment was engraved on had another word added.

‘What does this mean?’ he thought.

Lu Ye wanted to ask what was going on, but senior brother San obviously didn’t want to talk anymore and Lu Ye didn’t want to press him. He stood up from the disc and said to senior brother San: “Thank-you, senior brother!”

As he turned around to go outside, he saw eight bare young saplings by the disc, one of which had grown a single thin, fragile, and delicate leaf…

‘Does the word on the back of my jade card mean I have a talent score of one small sapling?’ He inwardly guessed.

“Young friend!” Senior brother San suddenly said.

Lu Ye, who had walked to the door, turned around and asked: “Senior brother, what’s your order?”

Senior brother San said: “Remember all those things I told you earlier? Young friend, act as if you never heard them.”

Lu Ye: …

He walked out of the tent and took a few deep breaths as a strong sense of crisis emerged in his heart.

Although he was not sure whether his talent was high or low, just looking at senior brother San’s rhetoric and attitude before and after the test, Lu Ye felt it was far from good.

‘I am afraid that my talent is a bit… extraordinary. But I still have to find someone to confirm it.’

Lu Ye turned his head and looked around, and suddenly saw a figure standing quietly in a corner. He walked straight over.

Halfway there, the person also saw Lu Ye. They smiled and waved at him.

As he approached, Lu Ye greeted: “Miss Yu.”

Yu Xiaodie joyfully replied: “Brother Lu.”

It was apparent that Yu Xiaodie’s mood was much better than the day before.

She had finished her testing and her results were pretty good.

Lu Ye lifted the jade card in his hands and handed it over to her: “Can you help me see what’s going on with my talent score?”

Yu Xiaodie took it, and said with a smile: “Since Brother Lu can activate his spiritual aperture, his talent is definitely not… lacking!”

When she spoke the last word she was reading the back of Lu Ye’s jade card. At the same time, her eyes shot open wide in surprise and her tone of voice became hesitant.

Seeing her react like this, Lu Ye immediately understood.

‘It seems as if my talent is really unsatisfactory?’ he thought.

“Miss Yu, how is your talent?” Lu Ye asked.

Yu Xiaodie said, “Similar to Brother Lu’s.”

Lu Ye waved his hand: “You don’t have to comfort me. I understand the situation. Is it true that the smaller the number, the lower the talent?”

Yu Xiaodie pursed her lips, trying to think of how to comfort Lu Ye. But she didn’t know what to say, so she finally just nodded: “Yes.”

“No wonder.” Lu Ye remembered the last words senior brother San said, and secretly thought that cultivators were the quite pragmatic bunch.

Yu Xiaodie said: “Brother Lu doesn’t need to feel discouraged. The test today was not the standard one; the formation used was not advanced, so there would of course be some mistakes made.”

Lu Ye smiled: “Regardless of the quality of the formation, once the result is out I can only face it calmly.”

Yu Xiaodie looked at him curiously: “Brother Lu really isn’t worried about it?” Lu Ye’s free and easy way didn’t seem to be a charade, but most people would get at least a little frustrated when they received such results.

Lu Ye looked not far away, smiled slightly and said: “Compared with those people, I am very lucky to be able to cultivate at all.”

Following his gaze, Yu Xiaodie could see a large group of desperate people gathered, all of whom were eliminated from consideration for having insufficient aptitude.

The two Liu brothers were among them.