Even to this day, no one knows just how vast the Endless Sea really is, or exactly how many continents lie within it.
Even the Xuandao Sect, with a legacy spanning millions of years, only possesses sea charts for the Endless Sea routes leading to the four outer regions beyond the Earthly Mystery Realm.
It’s not that the Xuandao Sect lacks the power to explore the entire Endless Sea—it’s simply that there’s no need to.
Cultivators at the Great Ascension stage can traverse space and cross regions in an instant.
Any major disturbances or powerful energy fluctuations within the Endless Sea are all monitored by the major hegemonic powers.
Otherwise, the human race of the Earthly Mystery Realm wouldn’t be able to keep the demon clans of the Endless Sea in check.
However, being able to monitor major disturbances and energy fluctuations in the Endless Sea doesn’t mean these hegemonic powers are willing to spend time and effort meticulously charting the entire Endless Sea.
Frankly speaking, aside from existences above the Tribulation Transcendence stage, nothing else even catches the eye of these hegemonic powers with their ancient legacies.
Trivial matters that don’t affect the bigger picture aren’t worth them making a fuss over.
Three months later.
The Tianyuan Merchant Guild’s tower ship finally arrived at a dock in the Eastern Pole Region.
This dock was also the property of the Tianyuan Merchant Guild and served as one of their established footholds in the Eastern Pole Region.
After arriving at the dock, Manager Lin—the same man who had previously sold Ye Qingxuan his boarding pass—appeared once more. Looking at the crowd already gathered on the deck, he announced loudly:
“Everyone, we have arrived at the Eastern Pole Region. Please go about your business!”
Hearing this, Ye Qingxuan paid no attention to the others and left the tower ship on his own, heading deep into the Eastern Pole Region.
Watching Ye Qingxuan’s departing figure, Manager Lin’s eyes flickered as he studied him for a moment.
In the end, though, he withdrew his gaze and abandoned whatever he had been considering.
Turning his head, he instinctively glanced at the few people chatting and laughing leisurely as they made their way off the ship, a strange look flashing through his eyes.
After leaving the tower ship, Ye Qingxuan didn’t rush on his way.
The Eastern Pole Region wasn’t like the Eastern Region, where every major city had teleportation arrays.
In the Eastern Pole Region, only cities under the rule of the same power had interconnected teleportation arrays built between them.
In other areas, there were simply no teleportation arrays for long-distance travel.
That’s why cultivators in the Eastern Pole Region often had to rely on flying to get around, and very few traveled across regions.
Under these circumstances, Ye Qingxuan had no choice either.
Until he found a suitable location to build his city, he could only fly.
But flying in the Eastern Pole Region—where demon beasts and humans coexisted and no major power kept everything under control—meant he could run into danger at any time.
So Ye Qingxuan decided to first open the Realm Gate and have his true body send some things over before continuing his journey.
After arriving at a secluded mountain forest.
Ye Qingxuan set up an array formation and carved out a simple cave dwelling.
Once everything was ready, he opened the Realm Gate that his external incarnation had been carrying all along, connecting it to the Qingxuan Grotto-Heaven Blessed Land.
In moments, a storage pouch drifted out from the Realm Gate and landed in Ye Qingxuan’s hand.
Opening the storage pouch, Ye Qingxuan took out a Realm Suppression Tower and sat down cross-legged to refine it on the spot.
Previously, aboard the Tianyuan Merchant Guild’s tower ship, Ye Qingxuan had refrained from opening the Realm Gate to send the Realm Suppression Tower to his external incarnation, just to be cautious.
Ever since Ye Qingxuan’s cultivation broke through to the late Nascent Soul stage and his artificer attainments rose to mid-tier sixth rank, he had upgraded all four Realm Suppression Towers to mid-grade spirit artifact level.
As for why he didn’t upgrade them to high-grade spirit artifacts?
Because at the Nascent Soul stage, using high-grade spirit artifacts was still somewhat taxing—he couldn’t sustain them for long in battle.
Inside the storage pouch, besides one Realm Suppression Tower, there was also a sixth-rank mid-grade flying boat, three sixth-rank mid-grade combat puppets, a stack of sixth-rank talismans of various grades, and over a thousand formation discs of fifth and sixth rank.
The precious materials needed for combat puppets were far more than those for auxiliary puppets.
Given the Tianfu Shop’s current influence, Ye Qingxuan had only managed to collect enough sixth-rank spirit materials to craft three sixth-rank mid-grade combat puppets.
To gather all the heavenly treasures and earthly rarities for crafting sixth-rank puppets, Ye Qingxuan had spent nearly 150,000 top-grade spirit stones.
All three sixth-rank mid-grade combat puppets he crafted were sent to his external incarnation.
Ye Qingxuan had inscribed several top-tier spells onto the bodies of these sixth-rank mid-grade combat puppets.
While they might still fall short against mid-stage Spirit Transformation cultivators, they should have no trouble dealing with ordinary early-stage Spirit Transformation cultivators.
The energy source for these three sixth-rank puppets was low-grade spirit crystals, obtained by trading Ye Qingxuan’s nuclear explosion pill formula.
Ye Qingxuan went to such great lengths to ensure that the sixth-rank mid-grade puppets he built had no obvious weaknesses.
Even the sixth-rank mid-grade flying boat was meticulously crafted, powered by an energy-gathering grand array set up with six low-grade spirit crystals.
Using up his remaining 30,000 low-grade spirit crystals had pained Ye Qingxuan for quite a while.
Those were spirit crystals meant exclusively for high-tier cultivators!
Aside from exchanging contribution points through the Earthly Mystery Realm Alliance, Ye Qingxuan still had no stable channel for obtaining spirit crystals.
Suffice it to say, at present, Ye Qingxuan’s 30,000 low-grade spirit crystals were dwindling with each one used.
No wonder Ye Qingxuan felt the sting.
But his external incarnation was of vital importance.
For the safety of his external incarnation, Ye Qingxuan had to be as thorough as possible.
He prepared every possible trump card for his external incarnation so it could better establish itself in the Eastern Pole Region.
Ye Qingxuan believed that whatever he invested today, he would earn back in the Eastern Pole Region sooner or later.
Just as Ye Qingxuan was refining the Realm Suppression Tower—
Several hundred li away from him, a fierce battle was breaking out.
This battle was an ambush by a group of bandit cultivators from the Eastern Pole Region against Han Ming and his companions.
As it happened—
Among the cultivators who had boarded the Tianyuan Merchant Guild’s tower ship to come train in the Eastern Pole Region, none of the people Han Ming had invited—those who accepted his invitation—had any guardians accompanying them.
Their group consisted either of down-and-out scions of great families whose clans had been destroyed, fleeing to the Eastern Pole Region to escape powerful enemies…
Or, like Han Ming, they were truly young masters from great families who had secretly slipped away to gain experience.
Perhaps because they shared similar interests, these people happily accepted Han Ming’s invitation.
The group hit it off immediately and decided to explore the Eastern Pole Region together, experiencing a different kind of life.
Little did they expect that after getting far from the Tianyuan Merchant Guild’s tower ship, they would suddenly be ambushed.
By now, Ye Qingxuan was already a Nascent Soul cultivator, so a distance of just a few hundred li was naturally within his perception.
Sensing the battle fluctuations, Ye Qingxuan—who had been sitting with his eyes closed, refining the Realm Suppression Tower—opened his eyes.
He set down the Realm Suppression Tower and stood up.
Taking out several dozen formation discs that had just been teleported over, he set up a small sixth-rank protective array formation.
Having done all that, Ye Qingxuan clapped his hands, smiled in satisfaction, sat back down cross-legged, closed his eyes, and resumed refining the Realm Suppression Tower.
If you want to live long, you have to mind your own business and avoid getting tangled in karma.
This was a vital external incarnation—if it perished, his plans for the Eastern Pole Region would be delayed indefinitely.
That would greatly slow the growth of the Qingxuan Grotto-Heaven Blessed Land and Ye Qingxuan’s true body.
That was the last thing Ye Qingxuan wanted to see.
He had invested so much effort—naturally, he didn’t want it all to end in disaster.
So, he could only be cautious, cautious, and more cautious!
