Chapter 338: Tree Cultivation
Spirit vein Xiang Yu thought to himself that he finally had a solution to the endlessly growing branch problem.
He concentrated on his tree body, feeling every part of it - how the roots stretched deep into the ground and interacted with the crystal formations beneath, how the branches interacted with the environment around them.
The sensation was strange yet somewhat familiar.
Xiang Yu thought to himself that since he was bound to reach the limit of how much he could grow in this restricted space, he would remove the protection barrier around the cave and let the tree expand. After all, he was the tree now, and he was feeling somewhat uncomfortable without being able to stretch his branches fully.
It was like being confined to a tight room where he couldn’t even stand up straight - a feeling he definitely didn’t like.
He was still going to keep the concealment formation though as he didn’t want to have any unwanted visitors. Of course, almost everyone in the sect now knew not to come within a certain radius of this area, but he felt more comfortable with a concealment formation since it could hide what was happening here and prevent scaring the other disciples.
Although he was removing the other formations, he didn’t think it mattered much. The defensive and attacking formations he would put up here would always be at the same level or below that of the sect-wide formation, meaning they probably wouldn’t matter much against an enemy who could breach the sect-wide formation.
In fact, it was actually better to just have it as another sect-wide formation so he could stack them.
Even so, he wasn’t just going to grow into a huge immortal tree looming over the entire sect. That would scare people too much and also didn’t follow his low-key style. One had to remember that the tree was himself, so being this massive beacon that everyone stared at didn’t make him comfortable at all.
He hoped he would get used to it eventually though as at some point he was bound to become enormous - maybe even like the World Tree someday. But for now, he would just take small steps.
He focused his energy and took control of his root system.
He then moved the roots underground, directing them toward the surface. Without the barrier blocking them anymore, the roots pushed through the earth and emerged outside the cave in one of the locations he had chosen as outlets for the qi gathering formations.
In that spot, a single root sprouted upward from the ground. Then slowly, it bloomed into a full tree. Though not as large as the main tree, it was still a decent size. The area around it instantly filled with rich spiritual energy.
Xiang Yu thought to himself that he could redistribute parts of himself like this throughout the entire sect. And since the spirit vein was essentially him now, he could even decide what level of energy to provide to each individual branch.
He began distributing his mass throughout the sect grounds.
This would help improve the overall scenery while also preventing him from feeling claustrophobic.
After redistributing several more branches across the sect, Xiang Yu finally felt comfortable and relaxed. He thought to himself that now that he thought about it, wouldn’t the disciples be quite surprised to suddenly find fully grown trees appearing out of nowhere?
Well, he would tell his martial aunt about it after lunch. He should also ask her to warn the disciples so they wouldn’t suddenly start chopping him down. Although the damage probably wouldn’t hurt him much, he definitely didn’t like the idea of being attacked with axes and saws.
Since just being a tree all day was rather boring, spirit vein Xiang Yu would mostly spend his time joining the light clone in research. Though his research was mainly focused on plant-related topics as he tried to analyze all sorts of plant memories he had received after merging.
As he worked through these memories, he wondered if he could actually cultivate in his current form. He did have some memories of tree monsters and their cultivation methods, but he didn’t know exactly how to go about applying those methods to his own situation.
...
Most creatures generally cultivated through qi, absorbing spiritual energy and continuously enhancing themselves through it. But as the spirit vein, Xiang Yu had access to vast amounts of qi - more than he could ever need - yet he didn’t feel particularly powerful. The endless flow of spiritual energy coursed through his tree body, but it felt more like being a conduit than actually growing stronger himself.
He wondered if his cultivation path was different. The current method he understood relied on devouring all sorts of treasures to improve his grade as a spirit vein. But that would probably just increase his conductivity rather than strengthen him. Was this really the only way?
After spending considerable time thinking through various possibilities, he couldn’t find any alternative approach that would work.
But during his contemplation, he did discover something interesting.
He could actually access his spiritual sea - not his original spiritual sea, but the spiritual sea belonging to the spirit vein. Well, this discovery wasn’t entirely surprising since he could already access the spiritual seas of his other clones.
This one was completely different though.
Besides the sea of qi that stretched endlessly, even bigger that his own sea of qi that was incredibly MASSIVE, Xiang Yu realized that he could actually build the foundation bridge here. He hadn’t really attempted the construction yet, but the foundations were there, just like they had been with his main body.
He had previously tried building similar bridges with his other clone bodies, but they had never seemed to work. He wondered if he needed to possess an actual living body for such thing to work. He guessed that was probably how it worked, which would explain why old monsters who had died always wanted to possess living people rather than corpses when seeking new bodies.
It seemed his other clones were still just sophisticated forms of puppeteering rather than true secondary bodies. It seemed his clone technique still needed some work.
As he thought about this, he suddenly had an idea and tried summoning his system. Since this spirit vein body counted as a true living creature, he should theoretically be able to access his system here, right?
But when he made the attempt, there was no response. The screen didn’t appear, and he felt no connection to the system’s functions.
"Well, figured as much," he thought.
The system was really strict. It even had some kind of DRM check. This meant that if he were to die, even if he somehow managed to reincarnate, the chances of him retaining access to the system would be extremely low.
Well, he didn’t believe he had a second chance so it didn’t matter to him much.
Now it was time to try building the bridge in this tree body. He wondered if he would end up becoming an Integration Realm tree monster.
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