Chapter 45: The Differences Between Heavenly Treasures

"Senior Brother Lin Yi, have you broken through again?"

Standing outside the courtyard, Chu Ling'er felt a sudden surge of powerful energy emanating from the room, and her face immediately lit up with joy.

"That's right! My cultivation has now reached the mid-stage of the Nascent Soul realm!"

Lin Yi's extremely excited voice echoed from inside the room.

Although that day's martial arts competition for marriage had ultimately been disrupted by Ye Fan, preventing him from clinging to Murong Qian as a patron, Chu Ling'er had managed to procure numerous rare heavenly treasures from her father upon their return and gifted them all to him.

Aided by these resources, Lin Yi had successfully achieved a breakthrough.

"Congratulations, Senior Brother!"

"If that Ye Fan knew how fast you've been breaking through, his jaw would surely drop in shock!"

"At this rate, surpassing Ye Fan is just around the corner!"

Chu Ling'er's single-minded desire was to trample Ye Fan beneath her feet, and Lin Yi was her only hope.

Yet, had she known that Ye Fan had already reached the Spirit Severing realm, one could only wonder what her thoughts would be.

"Rest assured, Junior Sister! The day my cultivation advances further will be the day I exact my revenge on Ye Fan!"

Lin Yi was now brimming with confidence in his own strength.

As long as he had sufficient resources for cultivation, coupled with the assistance of the otherworldly demons, he was entirely certain he could eliminate Ye Fan.

"Senior Brother! Take some time to properly regulate your breath. I'm going to share this wonderful news with my Father!"

With that, Chu Ling'er hurried toward the grand hall of the Linghan Sect.

Inside the hall, Chu Zhongtian was currently deep in worry over the upcoming Northwest Territory Sect Tournament.

"Father! I have wonderful news to share with you!"

"Senior Brother Lin Yi has broken through to the mid-stage of the Nascent Soul realm!"

"During this time, Senior Brother Lin Yi has been cultivating with relentless diligence. He has never given up on avenging himself against Ye Fan."

"In truth, you shouldn't have expelled him from the sect back then, but fortunately, Senior Brother holds no bitterness in his heart."

"His loyalty still lies with us!"

"Father, why don't you make an exception and allow Senior Brother back into the sect?"

Hearing this, Chu Zhongtian shook his head and replied, "Our Linghan Sect has never had such a precedent."

"Back then, Lin Yi provoked everyone's wrath; he brought that upon himself."

"If we were to take him back into the sect now, I'm afraid it would provoke discontent among the elders."

Chu Ling'er, however, stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Chu Zhongtian's arm. "Father, that is merely their prejudice."

"You are the Sect Master of the Linghan Sect; matters of accepting disciples are not up to those elders to decide."

"Besides, if there was no such precedent before, you can simply create one now."

"With Senior Brother Lin Yi's talent and capability, he is destined to become a supreme powerhouse in this Xuantian Continent."

"When that day comes, the Linghan Sect's name will undoubtedly resound far and wide!"

After Chu Ling'er exhausted a flurry of persuasive and flattering words, Chu Zhongtian finally relented and agreed.

Yet, a lingering doubt remained in his heart. Even with those abundant resources supplied to him, under normal circumstances, Lin Yi's cultivation speed should simply not have been that fast.

Regardless, for the current Linghan Sect, welcoming Lin Yi back was not necessarily a bad thing.

***

Meanwhile, just as Ye Fan was fretting over his cultivation resources, he received an exquisite brocade box sent via expedited delivery from Zhongzhou.

Puzzled, Ye Fan opened the box to find five storage pouches and a letter nestled inside.

The moment his eyes caught the letter, Ye Fan's heart skipped a beat, accelerating rapidly.

Ignoring the storage pouches for the moment, he immediately retrieved the letter and began to read.

"Brother Ye Fan! You've been kept waiting!"

"I'm sorry! I still have no way of coming to the Northwest Territory to find you for the time being."

"These items are the resources I promised to send you. As I said before, I wanted to let you see what true resources look like!"

"Take these and use them first; if they aren't enough, just let me know!"

"..."

"Anyway, you must cultivate diligently and aren't allowed to slack off!"

"The next time we meet, if I find out you haven't made any progress, you'd better prepare to be disciplined by me!"

"Well, I don't know what else to say, so I'll leave it at this for now!"

Chen Qingshuang poured much of her feelings into the letter. Though she never stated it outright, every single word seemed imbued with her deep longing for Ye Fan.

Gently and carefully, Ye Fan folded the letter and placed it alongside the very first one he had received from her.

Only then did he reach into the brocade box and pick up the first storage pouch. The instant he unsealed it, a rich, dense aura instantly flooded the entire room.

This single storage pouch contained twenty rare heavenly treasures—any single one of which would be considered an invaluable treasure of immense worth in the Northwest Territory!

Never before had Ye Fan laid eyes upon so many magnificent treasures at once. The treatment bestowed upon the Holy Maiden by the Heavenly Sword Sect was truly enviable.

Even his mother, serving as an executive elder of the Heavenly Sword Sect, might not be able to produce so many wondrous items at once.

And this was merely the first storage pouch; the contents of the remaining four pouches would undoubtedly be just as extraordinary.

With these resources at hand, Ye Fan felt fully confident that he could push his cultivation to the next level.

Without wasting a single moment, he immediately settled into a state of deep meditation.

Crossing his legs, he retrieved one of the treasures and placed it into his mouth.

Upon sensing the aura of the heavenly treasure, the Heaven-Swallowing Sacred Body stirred once more, growing intensely excited as it greedily devoured the rare delicacy.

Before long, the contents of the first storage pouch had been completely consumed, and the spiritual energy within his body had surged considerably.

Without pausing, Ye Fan immediately opened the second storage pouch.

It likewise held twenty rare heavenly treasures. After he consumed ten more of them, his cultivation finally crossed the threshold into a breakthrough.

He smoothly transitioned from the early stage of the Spirit Severing realm into the mid-stage!

This enhancement in his cultivation realm subconsciously prompted Ye Fan to accelerate his devouring speed.

The Heaven-Swallowing Sacred Body turned down nothing; no matter how many heavenly treasures were fed into him, he could digest them completely within an extraordinarily short span of time.

Two hours later, Ye Fan unsealed the final storage pouch. By this point, his cultivation had already climbed to the late stage of the Spirit Severing realm.

Another nineteen heavenly treasures vanished into his stomach, rendering his cultivation realm increasingly stable, leaving him only a hair's breadth away from the Great Completion stage.

In less than half a day, the vast reserves of resources sent by Chen Qingshuang had been reduced to just a single remaining treasure.

Ye Fan held it in his palm, gazing at it for a long while, ultimately unable to bring himself to consume it.

Since he was already lacking only this one, he decided to keep it as a keepsake to remember her by.

Carefully, Ye Fan stored away the final heavenly treasure alongside his collection of letters.

Yet, desiring to reach the Great Completion stage of the Spirit Severing realm as early as possible, he commissioned Hall Master Wang over the following days to purchase numerous heavenly treasures from the auction house.

To his dismay, however, he discovered that these local treasures from the Northwest Territory had a remarkably negligible effect on boosting his cultivation.

He could not quite say they were completely useless, but their impact was minor at best.

Puzzled by this phenomenon, Ye Fan sought out a professional appraiser of heavenly treasures to investigate.

After a thorough examination, the appraiser concluded that although they were nominally the same items, differences in their age and the environment in which they had grown were vastly distinct.

Consequently, the disparity in their efficacy became strikingly apparent.

When all was said and done, the environment of the Northwest Territory was simply too barren to provide these heavenly treasures with sufficient nourishment.

In other words, the resources found within the Northwest Territory could no longer satisfy the demands of Ye Fan's rapidly advancing cultivation.