Chapter 158

– Seventy-three-thousand low-rank Spirit stones
As the vibration grew stronger and stronger, Ye Chen easily followed it and came to a broad room.
This room was as large as tens of ordinary rooms combined, it had an area of around a hundred zhang; a thick pillar was built in the middle of the room, which held a pure white sphere of light, and a dark-red book was silently floating within the light sphere.

An ancient manual?

Ye Chen’s eyes shone with a bright light, at this moment, he was just in need of an Earth Realm martial art. ‘I just wonder what kind of martial art was recorded in this book…’ thought Ye Chen.
Taking a few steps forward, Ye Chen instantly showed a vigilant look and hurriedly moved to the right.
Puff!
A nearly two meter long, thick thorn, that was condensed from bright white light thrust out of the ground. That thorn moved swiftly, and even let out a shrill swishing noise. If Ye Chen wasn’t that sensitive and nimble, he would have already been pierced by that light thorn, and teleported out of this palace.
Staying still for a short while, Ye Chen raised his head and looked at the air, as he murmured,
The ground is not safe, what about the air? Hm, I better don’t be too reckless, after all this Heavenly Dream Battle Palace is immeasurably mysterious, how could it just leave the air perfectly safe? I suppose more dangerous traps were set in the air.

Thinking of this, Ye Chen took out a low-rank spirit stone and threw it into the air.
Puff!
A tiny hole showed up on the left wall, from which, a beam of light darted out and struck the stone into a puff of smoke, which then dissipated into the air without leaving even a trace.

I can never block that with my protective Zhen Qi.

Roughly measuring the power of that beam of light, Ye Chen shook his head. The air was even more dangerous, and he could only walk to that pillar.
However, Ye Chen immediately stopped after he lifted up his foot. Just at that moment, another person walked in from the other door of the room.
That was Yin Wuqing, the ‘Prince Devil’.
Seeing Ye Chen, Yin Wuqing looked a bit surprised. He didn’t think that Ye Chen could make it this far. Since Ye Chan had already passed the trial, he must also have broken into the Clasping Yuan Realm.

What I need is a martial skill manual, what about you?
Standing still, Yin Wuqing asked Ye Chen.

Cultivation technique.
Ye Chen said.
Nodding his head, Yin Wuqing continued,
Good, if the art recorded in this book is a martial skill, then I will have it, if it’s a cultivation technique, you will have it; if it’s neither of these two, the stronger one of us will have it. I assume that you also don’t want any unnecessary conflict, do you?

Yin Wuqing never wanted to start a fight against Ye Chen. He was now an early Clasping Yuan Realm martial artist and also possessed the sword intent, this meant that he was definitely a troublesome opponent. Yin Wuqing would rather compete against those Hidden Dragon Ranking martial artists than fight against Ye Chen, of course, it didn’t mean that he was afraid of Ye Chen, he just didn’t want to fight a hard yet worthless battle.

Okay, but on one condition. If I get this book before you, and it happens to be a martial skill, you can’t just take it away, instead, you have to trade for it with an equally valuable thing, and vice versa.

Ye Chen agreed with Yin Wuqing, he was by no means a battle addict and he also wanted to avoid all unnecessary fights if possible. Besides, at this moment his Hidden cloud Sword was already broken, and without a sword, he couldn’t release his full power.

Fair enough.

Yin Wuqing firmly believed that he could get the book ahead of Ye Chen, and what Ye Chen just said further had stimulated him.
Briefly pausing, Ye Chen looked around the room and said,
At this stage, we should just try to approach that pillar in any way we could, this is not as easy as it looks to be.

Hearing his words, Yin Wuqing stamped his foot against the ground; followed with his move, a stream of power spread out from under his foot.
Along with a series of puffing noises, waves of white light thorns thrust out of the ground and pierced right into the air.
After two blinks of an eye, those white light thorns completely faded.
Although Yin Wuqing had memorised the location of every white thorn, as a very cautious person, he stamped his foot again and released an even stronger stream of power.
In the next moment!
Half of the room was filled with thick white light thorns that had just suddenly burst out of the ground; the tip of every white light thorn was sparkling, like the brightest star in the night. Looking at this scene, even Ye Chen felt his scalp go numb.
Yin Wuqing said as he slightly frowned, every time, the location of each thorn would change, and clearly, a fight would do neither of us any good.


Then let’s just wish that the martial art recorded in this book is either a martial skill or a cultivation technique!
Ye Chen gave a faint smile. He didn’t agree with what Yin Wuqing said, even if they needed to fight, he just had to seal the space around his body with his Qi, and prevent himself from vibrating the ground and triggering those white light thorns.
Extremely carefully, both of them began walking towards the pillar located in the middle of the room.
Puff!
From time to time, a few white light thorns would suddenly dart out of the ground. While dodging those thorns, neither of them dared to release all of their Qi; because they had no way to find out if another white thorn would dart out from the place they were going to land, if the landing spot was also dangerous, they could at least once again dodge it with their remaining Qi, and if the landing spot was safe, they could stand still and recover their Qi.
As for whether they would land on traps every single time, such situation was not likely to happen. If it does happen, they could only blame their extreme bad luck. After all, with their current cultivation level, they were far better than ordinary early Clasping Yuan Realm martial artists, their Qi was also abundant; however, they still couldn’t be too optimistic. Their whole Qi could only help them dodge at most seven times continuously, if the landing spot was still a trap by the seventh time, they would certainly fail.
Fortunately, such a situation never occured. The most dangerous situation they had encountered in this room was when they landed on traps four times in a row.
Soon after, both of them approached the pillar.

Get down here.

Almost simultaneously, they raised their arms towards the light sphere, intending to take it down with their Zhen Qi.
The light sphere stayed perfectly still.
Ye Chen injected Zhen Qi into his hands, and then put his hand on the pillar, he then swiftly pulled himself up into the air; while moving up, his two hands regularly changed positions, one of his hands would always stick to the pillar to stabilise his body.
Yin Wuqing looked at Ye Chen, he seemed to be pondering something. He believed that Ye Chen did this for a reason, he concluded that the air also might be dangerous and decided not to make any moves recklessly.
Learning from Ye Chen, Yin Wuqing also injected Zhen Qi into his hands, one hand stuck to the pillar and his whole body rose into the air. As he chased right after Ye Chen, Yin Wuqing moved even more nimbly, just like an ape.
That pillar was only twenty-four zhang tall. After two blinks of an eye, Ye Chen had already reached the top.
Sticking his left hand and feet on the pillar, Ye Chen crooked his five fingers of the right hand, and attempted to rip apart the light sphere.
Pop!
The light sphere contained a great amount of power that almost threw Ye Chen into the air.

Not like this!

Ye Chen growled in a low voice as he gripped the iron spear and instantly pierced towards the light sphere.
Clang!
The spearhead was blocked by a palm, letting out a metal-clashing noise.

Let’s just try our best!
Ye Chan laughed out loud and said. Followed by his voice, a red flame swooshed up from the spearhead, it shook off Yin Wuqing’s hand and then headed towards the light sphere.
The light sphere still remained unmoved, however, an area turned hollow on its surface, and in the meanwhile, a creaking noise was emitted by the light sphere.

[Earth Devil Shattering Hack]!

Yin Wuqing gave up on stopping Ye Chen, and instead, he turned his palm into an extremely sharp blade and directly hacked at the other side of the light sphere.
After that, waves of attacks were launched by the both of them, which struck the light sphere. Multiple hollow spots appeared on the light sphere, and the entire sphere was a little bit twisted.
In the exact moment when the light sphere shattered.
Ye Chen suddenly shook his body, countless streams of sword Qi abruptly emerged from around his body, and then swooshed towards both the lighting sphere and Yin Wuqing; in Yin Wuqing’s eyes, the entire room seemed to be filled with those streams of sword Qi.
After a series of clangs, not even a single hair on Yin Wuqing was harmed. Those sword Qi couldn’t even cut his skin open. However, after he put his hands down, he found that the light sphere was already broken, and that dark-red book was in Ye Chen’s hand.
Yin Wuqing snorted scornfully.
Although he was a bit annoyed, he still didn’t want a fight against Ye Chen.
Staying at the top of the pillar was not a wise idea. So, Ye Chen quickly descended back to the ground.
Glancing at Yin Wuqing, he opened the book and began reading.
A while later, Yin Wuqing, who stood twenty steps away from Ye Chen, asked,
What kind of art is that?

Ye Chen grinned and said,
Good luck to you, it’s a palm skill, and is an amazing one, mid-grade Earth Realm. To be honest, even I’m a bit attracted.

Yin Wuqing’s face turned dark as he responded,
We had a deal, do you plan to break it now?

Ye Chen shook his head and said,
What would you like to trade with?

Without any hesitation, Yin Wuqing took off his huge backpack and threw it to Ye Chen, and said,
Seven low-grade Earth Realm martial manuals, sixty-five Mortal Realm martial manuals, one low-rank treasure dagger, one low-rank treasure light armour, one low-rank short blade, three flame bombs, and five precious herbal plants, each of them worth more than 25 kilograms of pure gold, you can have them all.

As he took the backpack, Ye Chen asked in surprise,
Aren’t you going to at least take a look at this book? It might not suit you.

Yin Wuqing responded,
All physical skills suit me, no need to look.

Ye Chen opened the bag. As Yin Wuqing said, it contained all the valuable stuff. If Ye Chen guessed it right, only a small part of these valuable things was gained by Yin Wuqing himself, the rest of them were probably seized from other disciples. However, he didn’t care about where he got these things from, this bagful of things were extremely valuable!
Seven low-grade Earth Realm martial arts manuals were worth more than twenty-one thousand low-rank spirit stones, sixty-five top-grade Mortal Realm manuals were worth three-thousand, two-hundred and twenty-five low-rank spirit stones, that dagger was worth more than five-thousand low-rank spirit stones, that low-rank treasure armour was even more valuable than the dagger, it could cost more than twenty-thousand low-rank spirit stones; that low-rank treasure blade was worth no less than eight-thousand spirit stones, while the three flame bombs were highly effective weapons, each could kill a peak-level early Clasping Yuan Realm martial artist, they could even seriously harm mid Clasping Yuan Realm martial artists, and no one knew how to produce this kind of bombs, therefore, the price of them was incredibly high, every single one was worth more than hundreds of kilograms of gold, and if changed into stones, that should be five-thousand low-rank spirit stones; three bombs in total, would cost fifteen thousand low-rank spirit stones; as for the three herbs, they were the least valuable among all these objects, but they were still worth five-hundred low-rank spirit stones in total.
The total value of this bagful of treasures was around Seventy-three-thousand low-rank spirit stones.
Ye Chen seemed as if he was not going to give the book, he said,
Although you have quite a lot in there, they’re still not as valuable as this mid-grade Earth Realm book, if I give it to my school, I would gain three-thousand pieces of mid-rank spirit stone, that is a hundred and fifteen thousand pieces of low-rank spirit stones. You should know how valuable a medium rank Earth Realm martial art is, it’s more than enough to become the most powerful martial art of a rank 9 institution, I can’t just easily give away something like this.

Yin Wuqing paused. Ye Chen was right, mid-grade rank Earth Realm martial art manuals were indeed extremely valuable, ordinary rank 9 institutions would hardly possess a single one of them, while a rank 8 institution would have three of them at most. Although the Brute Devil Martial School was a rank 7 institution, they only possessed five to six mid-grade Earth Realm martial art manuals, and he had already read most of them; among the martial arts recorded in those books, two were body strengthening arts, such as his [Earth Devil Body Strengthening Technique], one was a supportive art, while the others were kick skills and movement arts, none of them suited him, otherwise, he would never pay so much attention to this one held in Ye Chen’s hands.
Ye Chen said,
If I hand this book to you, you would profit much more than me. Your institution would certainly award you with a huge amount of spirit stones, but I, I will not only lose such a valuable manual, but will also lose seventy-seven thousand low-rank spirit stone, am I wrong?


What do you have in mind?


Easy, I will read aloud this book for you, you can just memorise it. After you get back to your school, you can just practise according to your memory. As for this book, I shall have it.

Hesitating for a while, Yin Wuqing finally agreed.