Once I was all healed up after taking the pills, I looked around and saw that a door had actually opened for me to leave to the next stage. But why waste such a good opportunity to learn more about laws?
I walked up to the next pillar, and the moment I closed my eyes I found myself within a lush and vast mountain range that had massive rocks and boulders protruding from everywhere.
As I tried to find the beast of this area, the land shook slightly as a massive one-horn black snake rose from the south, while a turtle-like head rose from the north, and they both screeched causing the whole scene to shake. There, from the rocks, gray lines shaped themselves and I was once again kicked out of the area.
This was earth.
"Bro, at this rate I'll be an avatar," I chided myself as I began playing around with the lines that made the Earth laws.
Stone emerged from within the law, and modifying the structure of the lines reshaped the rocks, breaking some of the lines caused the earth to turn to dust, and fusing lines back together caused the dirt to shape back into other forms of rocks.
I continued doing the same for the rest of the pillars and figured out that I had great compatibility with elemental Laws, but anything else was too complex or at least I didn't know exactly how to modify it.
For example, a pinch of cold and a pinch of heat, along with a slight adjustment to pressure and you can create lightning. But I couldn't replicate it, and most I got was almost having my hands blow up.
Gravity also was a law that was too complex for me to understand, space laws aren't as tangible as other elemental laws, perhaps they work on a different spectrum or need a different set of rules or even conceptualization to even figure out and understand.
So after having learned all, I could from these law stones, I left the room and entered the fifth room.
And this one was more to my liking, in front of me there was a cultivation manual, and it clearly read, Three-Legged Golden Crow manual, second volume.
This was the continuation of the volume that the sect gave to all disciples of the Three-Legged Raven Sect once they entered the sect, and seeing that this was the sequel, I bet that many would want this so they can improve upon their Yang-oriented cultivation.
For me, this wasn't useful at all, I'm a Yin-oriented cultivator, poison is a dark attribute and doesn't work well with the purifying Yang attribute, even my Heart Flame is Yin oriented.
Many think that Yin and Yang could be categorized into good and evil, which is a false notion. The elements have nothing to do with good or evil, it's only the user, but the compatibility of the Yan attribute is pretty bad with me as its cleansing side is strictly against my constitution.
Yin however is pervasive and empowering and works well with my poison.
But the book wasn't what interested me here, no it was the thing that blocked the people from simply going in and taking it.
A restriction that was imprinted on the ground, and looking at the way it was inscribed I could figure out a few things.
The first part and was the external part of the inscription was designed to disorient people. The second part was made of a powerful killing formation mixed with hidden sword intent. The third part was made of Law. And this immediately helped me understand the purpose of the prior chambers.
All the other chambers were to prepare the cultivator to fight against this formation for the manual and at the same time a test to their understanding of what they had just been through. Since this test could be said to be the 'final exam' of the things that the cultivators had just experience it was a good method to see if the cultivators had actually learned from their experience.
Now, for something as powerful as this restriction, I'll need to be at least a nascent soul cultivation level to break it.
But for my eyes, this formation was nothing more than child play.
I pulled my brush and a small pebble that was thrown on the ground near me, after writing a few lines on the pebble and adding a few inscriptions, I casually threw the pebble towards the formation and waited for magic to happen…
***
"What is he doing? Did he lose his mind when he met the formation?" a disciple asked as he was sitting and waiting in front of the mirror world.
"I don't know, but who else wants to take a bet here? Do you think he can win? I'll book the bets for 2 to 1 in favor of Xiao Meng," the disciple said.
"Wow, aren't you trying to go broke? I know he managed to get away from many of the other tests, but this is simply asking to have your stones taken, he clearly won by using treasures, and now that this formation is up, unless he is a nascent soul cultivator, and has the physical strength to break through it, he'll be stuck there forever." The disciple said.
"I only book the bets, if you want to bet, go ahead, if you don't want to you can leave!" the bookie said.
The rest of the disciples were still not too sure about what to bet on, after all, Xiao Meng had already done the impossible for what a Core Formation level disciple could do, but this test, even for them when they first passed it was very difficult, and their pride didn't allow them to admit that someone of a lesser cultivation level could actually do what they struggle to do.
All the facts were against Xiao Meng, but not many dared bet, and the few who did so, bet only little and that was just to save face for being called out as cowards for not betting against Xiao Meng.
The bookie was annoyed at the nonexisting profits and sat down waiting for Xiao Meng to finish doing whatever he was doing with that small pebble.
"What in bloody tarnation is he doing? Shouldn't he start breaking the barrier? Why is he drawing on a pebble?" a disciple asked.
The question was in the mind of many other cultivators and even some complained that if Xiao Meng was this stupid to actually start doing art instead of breaking the barrier, that they should have bet more. But the bookie had already closed shop and they only had to regret not being decisive at first.
Suddenly, Xiao Meng threw the pebble into the formation and the small pebble turned to dust the moment it touched the formation.
A few disciples laughed at the idiotic attempt of Xiao Meng where he 'tried' to act all mysterious and it all ended up in utter failure.
Just as the people who issued the bet were about to come and collect. A sudden light shone from within the mirror world, and the barrier that took Nascent Soul level cultivators days of constant battering to break broke in a mere few seconds in front of Xiao Meng's pebble.
The shock from such sight was too much for many to bear, as this Core Cultivation disciple had just spat on all of their efforts with a mere pebble.
***
"Okay, that worked well."
I went up toward the manual and grabbed it. I didn't bother reading it and just pocketed it and moved on. Waiting for the next door to open up.
But instead of a door, a wide mirror suddenly showed up and the same elder that sent me inside was with me in the mirror world.
'Y, if he tries anything, kill him.' I spoke using my divine sense to Y.
'As you command, master." Came Y's mental reply.
"Xiao Meng, I'm really impressed, I honestly thought you'll make it at most to the intent mountain and I'll have to come in and save you, but you proved me wrong many times now," the man said with a tone that no one would ever believe to be a complimenting tone.
"Thank you, but I still have one more level," I said.
"Oh, no, no need, I just received words from the higher-ups. One of the sect Grand Elders had personally decided to allow you entry to the Inner Sect, you won't need to continue the trial. You'll also receive this," the elder said as he threw me a small ring.
I poured my divine sense on the ring and found that it also had a dimensional sub-space within it. It was far smaller than a holding bag, but what it had inside it was pretty much what one could call a fortune.
There were tons of spirit-increasing pills, cultivation pills, healing pills, spirit stones of medium to high grade. And even a few manuals inside along with a black robe of the Three-Legged Raven sect insignia on it. This was the same type of dress that the people who attacked the Purple Cloud sect used.
"These rewards are for you to increase your cultivation, and the grand elder, amazed by your talents had decided to gift you with one of his Tri-Colored Nascent Fruit. An Ascension material that you can use when you're tackling the Nascent Soul stage. It will increase your chances and help hide you from the Heavenly Tribulation that comes with the climb to the Nascent Soul Stage.
'Hide from the tribulation? That's possible? But isn't that counterproductive? Though the tribulation is really powerful, the rewards of suffering it and surviving are far greater than the climb to the Nascent Soul rank. But I wasn't going to share this information since it was given by the Poison God's book itself.'
"Thank you for the generosity, I'm undeserving," I replied with as cold of a tone as did the elder. He knew I didn't mean this as much as I knew he didn't mean his false sincerity.
"No worries, about the fruit since they grow only once every fifty years, you'll have to wait for a couple more years, the ones that the Elder Have are almost ripe so work well in these years to get to the highest stage of the Core Formation."
"I'll keep that in mind."
"Right, but, this isn't all I came here for. The elder actually was most impressed with your understanding of Formations and wishes to speak to you about something. So follow me." The elder said and walked back through the mirror he came from.
I can bet that the elder wants to ask about how I learned to decipher formations and if my knowledge is good enough to break through the Barrier of the Purple Cloud Sect. Guess what, that's pretty good for me, at least I'll be closer to the Purple Cloud sect, which will help greatly in managing their escape.