Chapter 2

The companions were above the mountain ravine, shouting Chen Mo's name and looking around. When they saw his figure, they all felt relieved and quickly lowered the rope they had prepared, allowing Chen Mo to tie it securely before they pulled him up.

However, after pulling Chen Mo up, the companions instantly kept their distance from him, still shouting incessantly.

"Damn! You fell into a shit pit!"

"Oh! Why do you smell so bad!"

"Did you faint from the stench? We called you for a long time before you responded!"

The chatter of the companions made him want to hit someone, but thinking about the discomfort in his body, he quickly retracted his hand halfway. If he hit someone directly, it would definitely result in a fracture.

"Get lost! Don't bother me, I'm annoyed!" Chen Mo said softly, controlling his body to walk towards a stream. Although there was no soap, he decided to wash himself temporarily, otherwise, he would surely be scolded if he went home like this!

After this incident, everyone lost the mood for further exploration and decided to go down the mountain and return home. The rope used to save Chen Mo was made from soft vines in the forest, which took the companions more than two hours to prepare. Chen Mo was extremely grateful for this, and he realized that he had been unconscious for nearly two hours.

When he returned home, it was already late, but his parents were still waiting for him to have dinner. He made an excuse that he had already eaten at a friend's house, and his parents did not ask further. He first took a bar of soap and thoroughly washed himself under the tap, then changed his clothes, and finally returned to his room to sort out the events of the day.

The person whose bones Chen Mo had buried was a cultivator, and specifically, a cultivator at the Core Formation stage. However, he was not from the Blue Sea Planet but from a cultivator planet, essentially an alien. As for the bones, they did not differ much from the humans of the Blue Sea Planet, but this could not be verified. Chen Mo was not a doctor or an archaeologist and did not want to desecrate the remains.

Why did a Core Formation cultivator end up dying a tragic death on the Blue Sea Planet, left to rot in the wild? The story was long and complicated.

The piece of green jade that flew to Chen Mo's forehead and stuck to his brow explained everything. This green jade was a jade talisman used by cultivators, which could store a cultivator's divine consciousness. To view the content, one needed to press it against their forehead and use their divine consciousness to enter. It was a necessary jade talisman for transmitting skills and secrets. The function of the jade talisman was related to the inscribed talisman patterns, with different patterns serving different purposes.

Of course, if the jade talisman had a divine consciousness restriction, attempting to enter it with one's divine consciousness could be dangerous. If your cultivation was high enough, the worst that could happen was being repelled. If your cultivation was three levels higher, you could even remove the restriction and freely view the content. However, if your divine consciousness was weak and the jade talisman had a restriction, the experience would be extremely unpleasant, with the divine consciousness suffering a shock and taking three to five years to recover, or even becoming a vegetable.

Fortunately, this piece of green jade had no protection, and once the restriction was triggered, it automatically allowed the content to be read. Chen Mo had never cultivated and had no divine consciousness, but his blood had stained the green jade, which counted as a form of refinement, thus triggering the restriction.

The green jade flew to Chen Mo's forehead and copied the information stored within it into his mind. Although the information was extensive, only a small portion was transmitted, otherwise, it would have overwhelmed Chen Mo and turned him into a vegetable. Even this small amount of information made him faint as he received it.

In the information transmitted by the green jade, the Core Formation cultivator was called Immortal Master Xuan Ling, also known as Ye Shang. He was a protector of the Ye family, a cultivator family, residing on the Ye Hui Planet, a planet of cultivators. During an exploration of a secret realm, he obtained a white jade pearl. Although he did not know its use, the restrictions protecting the pearl in the secret realm numbered 81, the highest number of restrictions in the realm.

Fortunately, Ye Shang had some expertise in array formations, but it still took Immortal Master Xuan Ling a hundred years to break the restrictions. Some of the restrictions were forcibly removed using his resources, allowing him to finally obtain the white jade pearl.

Just as he was overjoyed, a tragic event occurred. His companion, another cultivator named Yu Hai, suddenly attacked him, detonating his core to seize the white jade pearl. At the time, Immortal Master Xuan Ling was in disbelief and questioning the brotherhood of hundreds of years. Using the remaining essence of his core as it dissipated, he detonated the restrictions in the secret realm and used a life-saving teleportation array to escape to his sect.

However, he did not expect that the detonation of the restrictions in the secret realm would trigger a chain explosion, destroying his life-saving teleportation array as he teleported. When he woke up, he found himself on the Blue Sea Planet. Although he did not know it was the Blue Sea Planet, he realized his teleportation had gone wrong due to the extremely low spiritual energy in the area.

At this point, he was powerless to change his fate. Not only was his core destroyed, but his body was severely injured, and the teleportation had drained all his vitality. He had no hope but to wait for death.

Knowing his time was limited, Immortal Master Xuan Ling took out a jade talisman and used his last bit of divine consciousness to transmit all the information to it, informing any worthy person. He then compressed the remaining essence of his core into a seed of inheritance and attached it to the jade talisman before passing away.

The jade talisman contained all his information, as well as extensive knowledge of the cultivation world, including alchemy, artifact creation, talisman inscription, array formations, and a cultivation technique called the Xuan Zhen True Art, which was the technique he himself had cultivated. This could be considered an opportunity for a worthy person to advance.

Additionally, the jade talisman contained Immortal Master Xuan Ling's essence seed, which explained why Chen Mo's body had changed so much. Not only his strength, but also his constitution, agility, and mental awareness had improved, akin to a complete transformation. This was explained in the jade talisman, as not everyone could cultivate; it depended on one's constitution and opportunities. Especially the former, without a suitable constitution, one could not embark on the path of cultivation. As for opportunities, cultivation required inheritance, and someone needed to input the essence seed to allow one to sense the essence, otherwise, even with a cultivation technique, one would be unable to enter the path.

Chen Mo's constitution and opportunities were very fortunate. His constitution, which allowed him to undergo the transformation, indicated that he was suitable for cultivation. As for his potential, it was hard to determine without proper testing. The cultivation opportunity provided by Immortal Master Xuan Ling not only transformed his body but also allowed him to directly enter the stage of guiding qi into the body, enabling him to sense spiritual energy, saving him a lot of effort.

However, the essence left by Immortal Master Xuan Ling was minimal, though it was all he had at the time. It was just enough to allow Chen Mo to enter the guiding qi stage, far from the first level of the Qi Condensation stage.

Cultivation, the path to true self, involves absorbing the essence of heaven and earth, purifying and utilizing the body, and evolving to extend one's lifespan and enhance one's strength. The stages of cultivation include guiding qi into the body, Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment, Core Formation, Soul Formation, Great Ascension, and Tribulation Transcendence. Except for the guiding qi stage, the other stages are divided into ten levels each. The jade talisman did not provide information beyond these stages. Chen Mo was currently at the guiding qi stage, a novice, not yet a true cultivator, but he had taken a step beyond the ordinary and was on the path to becoming a cultivator. True cultivation begins at the Qi Condensation stage, where talismans, spells, and array formations can be learned and used.