Mu Lin stuffed the four bags into his ring, then carried the three girls to the cave entrance one by one and placed them inside, completely unaware of what was happening. Then Mu Lin retrieved the bags from his ring and took out an alcohol stove, starting a fire to cook macaroni for a late-night snack. He knew the girls had been exhausted all day and needed to replenish their energy. After preparing the snack, Mu Lin woke the girls up.
After hastily eating their snack, the girls stripped completely naked without the slightest hint of shyness around Mu Lin and crawled into the sleeping bags Mu Lin had already prepared for them to rest.
If Mu Lin hadn’t already confirmed that the girls were still virgins, he would have thought they were a group of promiscuous women. However, Mu Lin had gradually become accustomed to their actions, which gave him the chance to enjoy the daily visual feast. After all, Mu Lin had grown up quite a bit.
After tidying everything up, Mu Lin set up a maze formation outside the cave. It was an array that outwardly resembled the Eight Trigrams but inwardly followed the Five Elements. Its main purpose was to disorient anyone who entered it. This was something Mu Lin had learned during his travels back home. Then Mu Lin began to meditate to restore his true yuan energy. Although the day’s journey was nothing to him, the final exploration of the cave and breaking through its seals had consumed quite a bit of his energy. Mu Lin never fought unprepared, and since he now had the opportunity, he seized every moment to replenish his energy. At present, there was no danger, but who could predict what might happen during the long night ahead? At this moment, a thin wisp of white vapor began to rise from Mu Lin’s body, followed by more wisps, until the white mist gradually enveloped both him and the girls together.
About three hours later, Mu Lin rose and checked on the girls, who were still asleep. He glanced at the time and realized he had only practiced for three hours. He turned his attention inward and found his true yuan energy more refined than ever before, and his cultivation had even improved slightly. At this rate, Mu Lin believed he could break through to the middle-late stage of Yuan Dan within half a year. It seemed his decision to cultivate in the mundane world had been the right one.
In the more than five years since descending the mountain, Mu Lin had experienced many things and believed he had made some progress in understanding people and human nature, especially in the past year, when his gains had been the greatest. What Mu Lin didn’t realize, however, was that the human heart was the most difficult to truly grasp.
In the past, due to underdeveloped transportation and communication, people could not promptly learn about events happening elsewhere. This allowed the same deceptive methods to be used for long periods, even a lifetime. Cultivators often lived secluded in deep mountains, where information was even more scarce, making them more vulnerable to deception than ordinary martial artists. These martial artists would learn a single trick or technique and then disappear without a trace, using that one skill to deceive others and tarnish the reputation of cultivators. Meanwhile, the deceived ones were left with deep emotional scars, making it difficult to maintain a stable Daoist heart and ultimately ruining their cultivation. Therefore, cultivators in the past mostly practiced in remote, uninhabited mountains.
Mu Lin did not dare to dismantle the formation and began to explore the entire cave. He left the cave with the strange stones for last. When he had finished exploring the entire cave system, he realized they had arrived at the cave of the Meñía people, which had already been featured in National Geographic magazine. The magazine had also published archaeological findings about the cave, suggesting that this civilization existed between the 9th and 11th centuries. This ethnic group made the caves their homes, carving interconnected chambers into the cliffside. The caves contained meeting rooms, places for worship, and all other necessities for daily life, aside from their outdoor activities.
They established a vast kingdom with productivity and living standards significantly higher than those of surrounding tribes. Yet, at the height of their prosperity, they mysteriously disappeared in the 11th century. No one knew where they had gone. Judging from the production tools, daily necessities, and military equipment unearthed from their tombs, surrounding tribes could not have wiped them out. If it weren’t for skull reconstructions and DNA analysis techniques, many would have mistaken them for Native Americans, but they were not.
In such a place, Mu Lin had to be extra cautious. He carefully examined the surroundings. These annoying people had built their homes into the mountainside for no apparent reason. Because the cave walls were thick, his spiritual awareness could only penetrate a certain distance before fading. He had to physically move forward to continue his search, which took over an hour. Finally, he confirmed there was no sign of life other than their own, so he relaxed and began to explore the cave he had discovered.
This cave was located at the lowest level of all the caves, likely a hidden chamber. It was about ten meters below the uppermost cave. With such thick stone walls, ordinary instruments couldn’t detect it. His spiritual awareness initially scanned around the perimeter. The room had been sealed off by a massive stone, and after centuries of weathering, the outer wall had merged seamlessly with the surrounding rock. Without his spiritual awareness, it would have been impossible to discover this hidden cave.
First, he cleaned the outer layer of the stone wall and then used his true yuan energy to clear away the debris from the cracks. Mu Lin exerted himself and pulled out the large stone. Then, he began to probe the cave with his spiritual awareness from outside. He first examined the formation surrounding the energy stone and discovered that this formation was actually arranged using stones identical to the energy crystal inside. Unlike the formations he had previously encountered, this one sparked great interest in him.
This type of crystal contained abundant energy. Mu Lin vaguely recalled reading about such crystals before. Thinking back, he remembered this was something he had learned during his travels—a cave belonging to a cultivator who specialized in crafting artifacts. In a book titled “The Great Dao of Alchemy and Furnace,” this kind of stone was referred to as “floating stone,” an essential energy stone for forging top-grade flying swords. Unfortunately, the book only mentioned it briefly, with little detail.
Mu Lin remembered how angry he had been when he first read about it. If the cultivator knew about this stone, he should have thoroughly researched its origin, properties, and so on. Yet, the book ended up stating that the origin, quantity, and usage methods were unknown. Eventually, he learned that these stones had been completely mined out in the Central Plains due to the large number of cultivators. If the author hadn’t belonged to a sect specializing in crafting, he probably wouldn’t have even heard of them.
Now, he had actually discovered this energy stone. If not for the centuries that had weakened its energy, it would have been impossible for Mu Lin’s current spiritual awareness to penetrate it. He found that the formation merely prevented the energy from leaking out. Carefully observing the positions, spacing, and arrangement of the stones, he noticed they resembled the “Eight Immortals Formation” described in a book—a defensive array.
He carefully studied it. If some of the stones were slightly shifted, it would become a completely defensive formation. If the “Ten-Faced Ambush” formation were added inside, it would become the “Trapping Immortal Formation” described in the manual. Heh, never would he have imagined that on the distant American continent, far from the Central Plains, he would find a formation similar to the Eight Immortals Formation. Since he already knew the Ten-Faced Ambush, now he had also learned the Eight Immortals Formation. Hmph, even if an immortal came and didn’t like him, he could still play a trick on them.
Mu Lin was lost in his thoughts. He didn’t consider at that moment why these people had so many floating stones, where they had mined them from, or why they had left behind such valuable stones when they departed. Looking at the time, it was getting late, and if the girls woke up, it would be troublesome. Thinking about their clingy nature made Mu Lin shudder. If they saw the stones, they would surely insist he hand them over.
These girls had received modern education and believed that important items should be handed over to the government. How could he explain to them that he was a cultivator? Moreover, he wasn’t too sure about these foreign girls. Who knew if they might betray him? Thinking of this, he quickly stored the floating stones in his ring without even taking the time to study their energy properties.
Once the stones were safely in his ring, he didn’t even consider that no one in the world could currently take anything from him, especially not from his ring. After resealing the cave entrance and restoring it to its original state, Mu Lin returned to the cave where the girls were resting. He didn’t want anyone to discover his find. Although he wasn’t afraid of anyone, avoiding unnecessary trouble was always a good idea. The girls were still asleep, so he let out a slight sigh of relief, dismantled the formation, and climbed into his sleeping bag. After a night of turmoil, he needed some rest too.
Once he had rested a bit, dawn arrived. Mu Lin was soon awakened by the girls. Opening his eyes, he saw that the girls had already finished their morning routine and even prepared breakfast. Mu Lin sighed inwardly, having missed another chance for a visual feast. However, he noticed the girls were in particularly high spirits. Had they eaten something special? Before he could finish thinking, the girls surrounded him.
“Daniel, what did you feed us yesterday? Why do we feel so energetic today?” they asked in unison.
“Oh, it was just macaroni. I didn’t give you anything else. Did you eat something special for breakfast?” Mu Lin replied after a moment’s thought.
“No, we thought you might have given us something good,” the girls chimed in. Nothing special? How could they have such great energy? Normally, today should have been the most exhausting day for the girls. Even after a night’s rest, their energy shouldn’t have been this good, Mu Lin thought while eating his breakfast.
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