Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Chapter 2004  Unusual Pendant

Having essentially already decided that Jiang Li would be Chu Yang's first disciple without even getting the opinion of the master to be, Xuan Hao still ultimately decided that it might be for the best to inform Chu Yang about the entire situation instead of just bringing Jiang Li back to the sect and handing him over without saying anything.

Not only because it would be extremely confusing to Chu Yang who would have no idea what to do in that kind of situation but would also leave Jiang Li confused and not understanding what had just happened to him.

And although this kind of situation might be rather funny to watch play out, he didn't want to give a chance for resentment or anything along that line to grow between Chu Yang and Jiang Li because of something like that…

"Huh? Me? Taking on a disciple of my own?"

And unsurprisingly, the first thing he was met with when he brought up the matter of taking on a disciple of his own to Chu Yang, was a confused face that didn't seem to fully comprehend what he was saying. Clearly never having expected his master to ask him of all people if he wanted to take on a disciple of his own given how he was one of the busiest people in the sect. Spending almost every waking second practicing in either the combat hall or the ascension realm tower.

Still, after learning about Jiang Li, Chu Yang could not help becoming interested in the little prince and decided to follow along to the small kingdom to take a look himself. Not feeling that he was too young to take on a disciple of his own or anything along that line given that his master had been younger than he was now when he had taken him on as a disciple.

The only real reason why he had been somewhat reluctant to take on a disciple of his own when first approached had been entirely because he saw it as a potential waste of time that would take away from his normal cultivation time. Nothing else.

Now that he had become interested in Jiang Li and was willing to personally go and see the young prince for himself, Xuan Hao felt that he had done everything he needed to, as the rest was up to fate. After all, he had no intention of forcing a disciple on his own disciples, as he understood very well that doing something like that could breed resentment and bring about potentially disastrous consequences in the future.

So, although he had somewhat pushed Chu Yang in the direction of taking on Jiang Li as his disciple, he ultimately still left the final decision in Chu Yang's hands.

But… Given just how similar the two were to each other, he had a feeling that it was almost guaranteed that Chu Yang accepted the little prince as his first disciple.

As for losing a potential disciple because of this… He didn't really care much, as he had already taken on two new disciples and would need some time to get Lu Dongli adjusted to the sect and help her in laying down a proper foundation. Li Chi not requiring as much attention given how he was already part of the sect and wasn't someone who just started out on the path of cultivation.

Not to mention, outside of Jiang Li, there was still one potential disciple he needed to check out, one he had been saving for last because of how much more complicated this potential disciple was.

Not because he was particularly amazing compared to some of his other disciples, but instead because of the artifact in the shape of a normal-looking jade pendant that this little potential disciple carried around with him.

Shaking his head as he thought about that special jade pendant that he had bene unable to peek inside of without risking triggering the potential defensive mechanisms that had been hidden inside of it, Xuan Hao didn't linger around the small kingdom of the little prince after seeing that Chu Yang had already begun to subtly test the prince on his own.

Feeling somewhat bad for the little prince, who would have to go through another round of tests, that would undoubtedly be far more brutal than the test that he had put him through considering his combat-loving disciple wouldn't allow anyone with a weak will to become his disciple.

…

Arriving at the edge of a smaller kingdom that had only recently fallen under the control of the Star Shattering Sect and had previously been overrun with demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao found himself looking down towards a small city that could be considered one of the lucky few places that had barely managed to survive the demonic cultivator invasion before the Star Shattering Sect had emerged and taken control of the territory and driven back the demonic cultivators to the Frozen Wastelands.

Different from the two other disciples who had somewhat limited knowledge of the outside world beyond the small kingdoms that they found themselves in, this third disciple candidate along with the members from his clan were already aware of the wider world and knew about the existence of the Star Shattering Sect.

For this reason, a normally dominant family clan that had been one of the ruling cultivation clans within the kingdom that had by now fallen to demonic cultivators before the arrival of the Star Shattering Sect had become extremely subdued compared to the past.

In fact, the broken engagement of this potential disciple of his just so happened to be tied to the Star Shattering Sect as well, as he found out shortly after starting to investigate the situation himself, that the former fiancé of this little one had ended up together with a disciple from his sect.

It wasn't some melodramatic situation where the other party had been forced away from her childhood sweetheart but was more so that the former fiancé had been heroically saved by a disciple of the sect from a demonic cultivator and the rest developed naturally.

Given the status of the Star Shattering Sect, even if the two cultivation clans involved wanted to protest, there wasn't exactly anything they could do given the fact that they barely qualified as subordinate powers under the Star Shattering Sect after their territory essentially under the sect's sphere of influence.

Not to mention, one of the two cultivation clans didn't exactly want to complain about the situation in the first place given that the original genius that had been the target of the original marriage alliance had ended up stuck at the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, while the girl had shown remarkable talent and had already reached the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.

Of course, there was a lot more involved in this little marriage alliance between the two cultivation clans, but Xuan Hao honestly didn't really want to waste too much time going through the internal politics of the two cultivation clans that had somewhat fallen out with each other because of this entire situation. Instead, he just wanted to check out the little fallen young master known as Li Feng.

Well… Not entirely just him.

In fact, it wasn't wrong to say that he was far more interested in the artifact that had been cable of blocking his divine sense. After all, talented as this fallen young master was, he only barely reached the requirement for him to take on as a disciple when he had original left the sect to search for new disciples… And that was only if he could figure out why he had remained stuck at the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm and was unable to advance beyond that for the past three or so years from what he had learnt.

But then again, it wasn't too difficult for him to guess what might be behind the sudden inability to progress beyond the Qi Condensation Realm, as with his powerful divine sense, he could sense that the little pendant Li Feng was carrying around was siphoning the spiritual qi he absorbed directly from his dantian.

Though… From an outside perspective and even for Li Feng himself, it was difficult to notice this. On the surface just looking like his dantian was a seemingly bottomless pit no matter how much spiritual qi he absorbed.

Of course, it should have been possible for the Nascent Soul Realm seniors of Li Feng's family to notice this problem even if he himself might not have been capable of realizing the problem due to his low cultivation realm. Making the entire situation rather interesting, as it was clear that the Nascent Soul Realm seniors who should have investigated Li Feng's dantian in the past was unaware of the unequal relationship between Li Feng and the jade pendant leeching of him.

Meaning that while the jade pendant couldn't detect him or his presence when he investigated with his divine sense, it had been capable of detecting the Nascent Soul Realm seniors from Li Feng's family and should have promptly stopped absorbing spiritual qi from his dantian until they left…