Cultivation Begins From The Desert

Red Fox Ridge, Purple Cloud Cave.

When Zhouyang broke through and emerged from the Purple Cloud Cave, he was already a bona fide Late-Stage Foundation Establishment cultivator.

By this time, nine years had passed since he went into seclusion for cultivation, and it had been sixteen years since he last advanced to the Sixth Layer of Foundation Establishment!

It took him sixteen years to advance from the Sixth Layer to the Seventh Layer of Foundation Establishment, something he had not anticipated beforehand.

Mainly, after reaching the Sixth Layer of Foundation Establishment, pills like the "Nourishing Essence Pill" and "Golden Marrow Pill," which are Tier Three Lower Grade Spirit Pills, had little effect on him.

Moreover, he had taken too many of these elixirs, and although he could use the "Qianyang Immortal Light" to remove erysipelas, he couldn't eliminate his body's resistance to the medication.

So during these nine years of seclusion, he relied almost entirely on his own hard work, gradually raising his magical power to the peak of the Sixth Layer, and only with the help of the Tier Three Top Grade Spirit Pill, "Profound Pure Pill," did he successfully break through to the Late-Stage Foundation Establishment.

This method of increasing magical power through personal cultivation, although taking much longer, resulted in an incredibly solid foundation. For Zhouyang, who had only lived a third of his lifespan, it wasn't completely unacceptable.

Now that he walked out of the Purple Cloud Cave, his powerful Divine Sense swept over the entire Red Fox Ridge, and he quickly grasped the changes that had occurred on the mountain over the past nine years.

It was apparent that the previously rampant weeds and miscellaneous trees on Red Fox Ridge had been mostly cleared. From the foot of the mountain to halfway up, blocks of Spirit Fields had been neatly opened and planted with "Golden Pearl Rice" trees, covering at least hundreds of acres at a glance.

In a small valley halfway up the mountain, a dozen Spirit Woods were transplanted there by Spirit Plant Cultivators, each occupying a piece of land and growing in solitude, without having to compete for sunlight or rain with other plants.

Meanwhile, in the mountaintop area near the Purple Cloud Cave, several medicine fields had been sparsely cultivated, with a variety of spirit herb seedlings planted on them.

Compared to low-tier Spirit Plants like "Golden Pearl Rice," many spirit herbs have nearly stringent requirements for their growing environments.

For example, the vine mother plant of the "Purple Cloud Fruit" needs to grow in a dark cave rich in Spiritual Qi. Some spirit herbs prefer to grow in the shade of trees, while others can only grow properly under sunlight.

Thus, Spirit Plant Cultivators must open medicine fields in various places and plant spirit herbs that are best suited to the environment of the medicine field.

Generally, the higher the tier of the spirit herb, the more demanding its growth environment is.

This is why those high-tier spirit herbs in the Cultivation Realm are either gathered from the wild or flow from the Spirit Medicine Gardens of major sects.

Only those major sects with large enough territories and ample Spiritual Mountain Blessed Lands can find places that meet the environmental requirements for growing these high-tier spirit herbs.

Some truly well-established sects, like the Profound Sun Immortal Sect, will go to great lengths to lay down arrays that change the seasons, using human effort to interfere with the forces of nature, creating artificial environments suitable for growing various spirit herbs.

However, as Zhouyang's Divine Sense scanned the entire Red Fox Ridge, he did not see his Dao Companion Xiao Ying or the Eagle Lion Beast, assuming they must have gone to do something.

So he immediately took out a Communication Flying Sword and sent a message to Xiao Ying explaining his emergence, then headed to the Fire Bat Cave at the foot of the mountain.

The bat droppings inside the Fire Bat Cave had long been cleaned up, and this underground cave had now become the residence of the Flying Fire Bats being raised by the Zhou Family.

Zhou Yuanliang, a Beast Tamer of the Zhou Family, now resides outside the Fire Bat Cave, responsible for caring for those preliminarily trained Flying Fire Bats.

As for the other Zhou Family Beast Tamer, Zhou Xuan Zhao, due to his advanced age, has returned to the Yuquan Lake Oasis to spend his retirement years.

"Clan Leader, after years of taming by me and Seventeenth Uncle, five Flying Fire Bats, four females and one male, out of those initial young ones, have been successfully tamed. The remaining Flying Fire Bats either died during taming or were slaughtered by us after determining they couldn't be trained."

"Additionally, of the initial four pregnant adult female Flying Fire Bats, only two successfully gave birth to five live cubs, while the other two gave birth to dead cubs. The young cubs have now grown into juveniles."

"So currently, ten Flying Fire Bats live in this Fire Bat Cave, consisting of seven females and three males!"

Outside the Fire Bat Cave, upon seeing Zhouyang, who had been in seclusion for many years, come out, Zhou Yuanliang reported these years' results while congratulating Brother Nine.

Upon hearing that only ten Flying Fire Bats were successfully tamed, Zhouyang felt some regret, but he knew Zhou Yuanliang and others had tried their best.

So he did not blame anyone for this; instead, he patted Zhou Yuanliang on the shoulder with approval and said, "You've worked hard, Fifteenth Brother. Your successful taming of the Flying Fire Bats is a great contribution to the clan. After discussing it with our great-grandfather, rest assured you will be credited and rewarded!"

Praising his clan nephew Zhou Yuanliang, Zhouyang learned that Xiao Ying and others had gone to "Nightlight Town," where reportedly hundreds of mortals suddenly fell ill, suspected of an epidemic outbreak.

And while he was speaking with Zhou Yuanliang, Xiao Ying responded to the message sent by his flying sword.

After reading the message from Xiao Ying, Zhouyang's expression tensed, and he immediately released his flying sword towards the ore vein.

"Zhou Lang, you're finally out!"

In Nightlight Town, as Zhouyang descended with his Sword Light, Xiao Ying joyfully threw herself into his embrace for a hug.

The two had not seen each other for a full nine years. This was the longest separation since they knew each other, so it was no surprise that someone as shy as her couldn't help but act this way in public.

"Be good, Ying'Er. Tell your husband, what exactly is happening here? Could it really be a plague?"

Zhouyang gently patted the girl's shoulder with his palm while holding her, but then he asked about the pressing matter.

Hearing him mention this, the excitement on Xiao Ying's face was immediately withdrawn, and then she released her hands that were holding his body and looked at him, speaking softly: "It's not a plague, it's poison. The drinking water of these mortals had been poisoned!"

Upon hearing this, Zhouyang's expression changed abruptly. He looked at Xiao Ying with a grim face and asked in a deep voice, "Are you sure it's poison? Have you found out who did it? Was it man-made or by a demon beast?"

"The poison among the mortals has already been neutralized by me with Antitoxic Elixir soaked in water. As for who did it, I am still investigating. Currently, the possibility of it being a demon beast is the greatest!"

Xiao Ying explained how she used the Antitoxic Elixir to help the mortals detoxify, directly answering Zhouyang's question with facts.

If it were not poisoning, Antitoxic Elixir wouldn't have such an immediate effect.

"I understand the matter now, and I will thoroughly investigate this incident,"

Zhouyang nodded solemnly and immediately decided to investigate the truth of this matter personally.

He also agreed with Xiao Ying's speculation about the poison being from a demon beast but feared it was a human act. If it was a human who poisoned the water, the situation would be very complicated, and he must find out who the culprit is!

To catch the culprit, Zhouyang ostensibly left Nightlight Town with Xiao Ying and others, but in reality, he returned alone to the outskirts of the town using the "Golden Cicada Concealment Technique" to suppress his aura and hide, then released his Divine Sense to envelop the entire small town and the surrounding wilderness.

As of today, Zhouyang's Divine Sense coverage range had reached ten miles, while a typical First-Layer Purple Mansion Cultivator could only cover twelve to thirteen miles.

A Late-Stage Foundation Establishment Cultivator like Zhou Minghan had a Divine Sense range of only four or five miles, lagging considerably behind Zhouyang!

Such a powerful Divine Sense erased any doubt Zhouyang had about his future success in opening the Purple Mansion.

If even he couldn't successfully open the Purple Mansion, then other cultivators would have no chance as well.

While he used his powerful Divine Sense to monitor the entire small town, he also took the opportunity to count the number of mortals there, discovering that after nine years, the number of mortals residing in and around the town had exceeded twenty thousand.

He remembered clearly that according to his and the old Clan Leader Zhou Minghan's plan, the number of mortals the Zhou Family migrated to the New Oasis should only have been about twelve thousand people!

"These mortals really can breed, can't they?"

Zhouyang's eye twitched slightly, feeling quite troubled about this matter.

While he encouraged Zhou Family cultivators to have more offspring, he had the opposite view on mortals reproducing.

The land in the oasis is limited; if the number of mortals grows too fast, it may temporarily increase productivity, but it actually prematurely exhausts the oasis's growth potential.

If this isn't stopped, in less than thirty years, the New Oasis will become the next Jade Spring Lake Oasis!

"This can't continue. Once I return, I will have Ying'Er and Father research a sterilization formula. Those women who have already had three children must all be sterilized!"

Zhouyang gritted his teeth inwardly and made a decisively cruel and ruthless decision.

As for why women would be sterilized instead of men, obviously, it's because childbirth relies entirely on women, not men.

If a family's man is sterilized, but the woman becomes pregnant, then what happens?

Waiting outside Nightlight Town like this, Zhouyang remained there for over ten days.

He was quite patient, not getting discouraged even after over ten days without any findings, simply changing locations each day to wait.

After standing guard for twenty-four consecutive days, Zhouyang finally found the culprit who poisoned the water.

To his relief, the culprit was indeed a demon beast and not a human, as he feared.

It was an extremely rare Tier Two High-Grade demon beast, "Illusory Spirit Jade Butterfly." These demon beasts typically dwell within various Spirit Jade Ore formations, feeding on Spirit Jade and only come out on the surface during full moon nights to absorb Moonlight Power for cultivation.

The "Illusory Spirit Jade Butterfly" isn't toxic itself, but when it cultivates, some powder falls from its body, harmless to cultivators but poisonous to mortals who inhale it.

Zhouyang saw the "Illusory Spirit Jade Butterfly" gracefully dancing upstream a small creek where mortals from Nightlight Town fetched their drinking water.