The little old man didn’t respond. He lowered his head and led Shui Miao toward his office.
Originally, Shui Miao had thought the old man might possess some rare treasure. But after scanning with his spiritual sense, he found nothing particularly unusual.
The old man’s office was very ordinary—small in size and simply furnished.
After closing the door tightly, the old man fiddled with a bookshelf, pushing it aside to reveal an iron door. He took out a key, unlocked the door, and led Shui Miao inside. Surprisingly, it was a cave—though not a large one, about the size of a regular room. Inside, there was a huge steel cabinet containing a white stone.
Shui Miao couldn’t sense any spiritual energy from the stone.
When the old man pulled out a metal rack from the cabinet, Shui Miao couldn’t help but laugh. “Old man, are you losing your mind? Did you really think I was some clueless idiot? You actually want to fool me with just a stone? Don’t you think you’re underestimating me a bit too much?”
The old man, with his beady rat-like eyes glancing at Shui Miao, took out a large hammer from the cabinet. He swung it with full force and struck the stone. Immediately, a metallic clang rang out, and the hammer bounced back, causing the old man to stumble backward all the way to the corner, nearly falling over.
“Huh?”
Shui Miao was puzzled. That sound wasn’t right—how could a stone make a sound like metal?
The old man exhaled in relief but remained silent. He then took out a lighter and began heating the stone. As the white rock suddenly turned blood red, the old man quickly stepped back. The spot that had been heated erupted in flames! The flames vanished in an instant, and Shui Miao rushed forward to inspect the area, only to find no holes or even the smallest crack beneath the stone.
Strange! How could this stone be so miraculous?
Shui Miao was astonished. He had scanned it with his spiritual sense and found it completely ordinary. So why was it reacting this way? Could it be that this stone contained immortal energy—something far beyond his current cultivation level—making it undetectable to him?
Thinking this, Shui Miao placed his hand on the stone and channeled his spiritual energy into it.
The old man immediately stepped forward, waving his hands. “This stone will counterattack any force applied to it. Touching it with your hands is useless because the force you apply is too weak for it to even bother retaliating. Let me tell you this—it’s a one-of-a-kind stone in the entire world, worth a fortune. I’ll give it to you if you spare me. How about that?”
His spiritual energy penetrated halfway into the stone before being abruptly blocked by an unknown force.
This force was completely unfamiliar to Shui Miao.
“Haha, old man, you really think you can fool me? Your hotel is worth at most two million, yet you claim this stone is priceless. Now you’re telling me you’d rather give away something priceless than risk losing a mere two million? Are you really that foolish, or do you think I’m even more foolish than you?” Shui Miao pretended to be angry, slamming the stone with a palm. A wave of soul-devouring energy surged into the stone.
“Uh… Haha, young master, you misunderstood me. How could I possibly think you’re foolish? I still have a few smaller pieces of this stone, so giving you one doesn’t hurt me at all, right?” The old man smiled with fake flattery, clearly lying through his teeth.
The soul-devouring energy entered the stone without encountering any resistance and slowly began corroding and consuming the strange force inside.
Delighted, Shui Miao split his focus, simultaneously probing the old man’s thoughts.
To his shock, Shui Miao discovered the old man knew a secret—that deep within a cave, hidden inside Mount Everest, there was a fissure passage. Following this passage deep into the mountain, one would eventually find not just a few stones like this, but two entire mountains made of such stones!
So he had come to the right place after all!
Shui Miao withdrew a bit of his soul-devouring energy and realized the power inside the stone could directly enhance his spiritual cultivation!
Could it be an extraordinary spiritual vein?
Shui Miao couldn’t determine the stone’s true nature or identify what it exactly was, but he was certain—it could help him cultivate and improve his cultivation level.
Just as Shui Miao was about to channel all his soul-devouring energy into the stone, he suddenly sensed the mysterious force inside the stone violently disintegrate and scatter in all directions. Feeling these strange energies attempting to escape, Shui Miao was startled. In desperation, he quickly controlled his soul-devouring energy, wrapping around the escaping force and forcibly drawing it into his Sacred Yuan Ring.
“Boom!”
The white stone exploded, splitting into two gray fragments.
All the mysterious power inside had been completely absorbed into Shui Miao’s Sacred Yuan Ring.
In reality, the stone didn’t contain much energy. While it felt immense when scattered, when gathered together, it was only about the size of an egg.
“What!?”
The old man was stunned. “How could this happen? Why did it break? What did you do to it?”
Shui Miao frowned. “I just touched it. You hit it with a hammer earlier and nothing happened. Could a simple touch really break it? Oh! Wait, maybe it was because you hit it too hard just now, so it finally cracked. Anyway, forget that. Now, tell me—do you still want to give me this broken stone?”
“This… this…”
The old man was speechless. Suddenly, he felt like he had truly encountered a living ancestor.
Shui Miao turned and walked away, with the old man following closely behind.
As he walked, Shui Miao spoke indifferently, “Forget it. I don’t want to push you too hard. I’ll compromise. Just write a guarantee promising you won’t cheat customers again, and I’ll let you go. But if I ever catch you cheating someone—even once—you must willingly hand over this hotel to me. If you refuse, I have a hundred ways to make your life miserable.”
“Fine, I agree. I’ll go write it right now…”
This solution was acceptable to the old man—he just needed to stop cheating people in the future.
Shui Miao didn’t say much else. He sat back in his seat, channeling his soul-devouring energy to refine the special power within his Sacred Yuan Ring, while recalling the fissure cave the old man had known about. It was extremely deep, likely reaching deep into the heart of Mount Everest itself. Normally, treasures hidden deep inside mountains like that—what else could they be besides an extraordinary spiritual vein?
Wait a second!
Why would there be such a spiritual vein inside Mount Everest?
Could it be…
Shui Miao’s mind raced with possibilities. According to Feng Shui theory, dragon veins always protected certain lands.
Mount Everest was the highest peak in the world—what kind of dragon vein could be hidden inside it? Whoever obtained it and buried their ancestor’s remains at the critical point of this mighty dragon vein would essentially receive the protection of the world’s greatest dragon vein. Wouldn’t that make their descendants the rulers of the world?
Wow!
He really had come to the right place this time!
Suddenly, Shui Miao sensed something again—his soul-devouring energy had completely consumed the mysterious power inside the Sacred Yuan Ring.
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