Chapter 623 - 623: Didn't Find It

Elder Zhu had been very cryptic about what was above the eighth floor. He only gave Chu Qingyun a small hint, telling him to go to the eighth floor and look for a path leading up.

From this, it was clear that what lay above the eighth floor was a major secret within the Saint Extreme Sect—one that someone of Chu Qingyun's current status was not supposed to know.

The reason Elder Zhu had told him was surely because of what happened in the Withered Wood Forest. Chu Qingyun had defeated Pei Yongqing and He Liang of the Celestial Sword Sect and seized the Martial King Essence Pill, saving Elder Zhu from having to yield to Lei Jing.

Arriving at the foot of the Saint Extreme Tower, Chu Qingyun made his decision.

He would do as Elder Zhu said—go to the eighth floor and look for that so-called path leading up.

After all, Elder Zhu would never harm him.

'There shouldn't be any harm in trying.'

Chu Qingyun stepped into the Saint Extreme Tower and looked up to see a familiar person walking toward him.

Outer Elder Huang.

Seeing Chu Qingyun, a look of clear surprise flashed across Elder Huang's face. He blurted out, "Chu Qingyun, you... you actually came back!"

Chu Qingyun's gaze hardened. He stared at him and said, "The trial in the Withered Wood Forest is over, so of course I'm back. But Elder Huang, what do you mean by that? Was I not supposed to come back?"

Suspicion filled Chu Qingyun's eyes.

'This trip to the Celestial Sword Sect's Withered Wood Forest had been suspicious in several ways.'

'The Tianya Sect and Purple Cloud Sect knew he was going to the Withered Wood Forest ahead of time. Then there was that lunatic from the Stone Spirit Sect. All of it made Chu Qingyun feel that someone was targeting him.'

'And Elder Huang was, without a doubt, a prime suspect.'

"Hmph, nonsense!"

"Whether you come back or not has nothing to do with me!"

Elder Huang snorted coldly and strode out of the Saint Extreme Tower.

However, the moment he was outside, his expression instantly turned grim.

'Useless, all of them! The people from the Tianya Sect, the Purple Cloud Sect, and even the Celestial Sword Sect—they're all completely useless! I leaked Chu Qingyun's whereabouts to them, and they still couldn't manage to kill him!'

Elder Huang raged internally.

It turned out that after secretly arranging for Chu Qingyun to be sent to the Celestial Sword Sect's Withered Wood Forest, he had used his connections to leak the news to the Tianya Sect, Purple Cloud Sect, and Celestial Sword Sect.

These three sects were not on good terms with the Saint Extreme Sect. The Tianya Sect and Purple Cloud Sect, in particular, couldn't stand to see the Saint Extreme Sect produce a genius.

Elder Huang's plan was to kill with a borrowed knife.

But he never would have thought that Chu Qingyun, an eighth-level Martial Spirit, would actually possess the strength of a top-tier ninth-level Martial Spirit! The two "blades" he had borrowed were completely inadequate!

After cursing internally for a while, Elder Huang's face suddenly fell.

'This is bad. I promised Cai Mao and Zhou Jianxiong of the Qianshui Dynasty that Chu Qingyun would die for sure. But now he's back... how am I going to explain this?'

Chu Qingyun turned his head and stared at Elder Huang's retreating back for a moment.

Then he shook his head and headed up the Saint Extreme Tower.

'After all, Elder Huang is an Outer Elder and a Martial Emperor Realm expert. Without conclusive evidence, accusing him based on mere suspicion would only put me in a vulnerable position. So, I'll just put this aside for now. I'll let Elder Zhu and the others investigate.'

Reaching the seventh floor of the Saint Extreme Tower, Chu Qingyun didn't stop, heading directly to the eighth.

On the eighth floor of the Saint Extreme Tower, only Core Disciples of the Inner Sect could open the cultivation chambers. So, like the seventh floor, it was exceptionally deserted, and it was rare to see anyone.

'The path leading up…'

Chu Qingyun circled the eighth floor but found no path whatsoever.

The tower's staircase ended at the eighth floor; there were no more stairs leading up. The rest of the floor was no different from the ones below.

'There's no path here at all.'

Chu Qingyun searched two more times but still came up empty.

He even opened some of the temporarily unoccupied cultivation chambers but still found nothing.

'Could it be that this "path" isn't a literal one? Did I misunderstand?' he wondered.

He wandered around the eighth floor for a while longer. Still finding nothing, he resignedly went back down to the seventh floor.

Finding an empty cultivation chamber, Chu Qingyun placed his sect Token, preparing to begin his cultivation. He planned to use the Martial King Essence Pill to break through to the ninth-level Martial Spirit.

At this time, he still had over a thousand Saint Extreme Points left on his sect Token.

It was more than enough for three days of cultivation on the seventh floor, so there was no need to rush to find Zhou Ling and get his Saint Extreme Points back.

After the Saint Extreme Points were deducted, that special aura once again quickly filled the cultivation chamber.

And this time, Chu Qingyun once again felt it: a faint sense of being summoned from above!

'This is the third time. It's definitely not an illusion. Something up there must be summoning me! ...The feeling of being summoned... Of course! How did I not think of that before!'

His eyes lit up. He suddenly realized that when he was on the eighth floor earlier, he was so focused on looking with his eyes that he forgot to use that summoning feeling to find the "path leading up."

At this thought, Chu Qingyun was once again eager to try.

He was extremely curious about a secret that even an Inner Sect Elder like Zhu was so guarded about.

However, in the end, Chu Qingyun managed to restrain the urge to go up immediately.

'The secret is right there; it's not going anywhere. The cultivation chamber has just been activated, so there's no need to rush.'

'Besides, if I can raise my strength to the ninth-level Martial Spirit, I'll be even stronger. Then I'll have more confidence to face whatever comes next.'

Having thought it through, Chu Qingyun sat down cross-legged.

He calmed his heart and concentrated his spirit, and after a moment of adjustment, he took the Martial King Essence Pill from his Storage Ring.

A Martial King Essence Pill is a concentration of Primordial Power condensed from the Qi Sea of a Martial King Realm expert. A single pill often contains the vast majority of that expert's Primordial Power.

For someone at the Martial Spirit Realm, Refining a Martial King Essence Pill was an incredibly difficult task.

Fortunately, Chu Qingyun had the Devouring Power, and now he also had the powerful assistance of the seventh floor of the Saint Extreme Tower. Dealing with a Martial King Essence Pill from an Earth King Realm expert shouldn't be much of a problem.

From the moment he obtained the Martial King Essence Pill, Chu Qingyun had been hunted and pursued.

Only now did he have a chance to carefully observe this Martial King Essence Pill.

And it was only now, as he held the Martial King Essence Pill in his hand after taking it from his Storage Ring, that he discovered something. The Primordial Power in the surrounding space seemed to shift, slowly gathering toward the pill.

'So, this is the so-called power of a Primordial Pill…'

For the first time, Chu Qingyun felt a sense of curiosity about the Martial King Realm.

The transition from the Martial Spirit Realm to the Martial King Realm was a fundamental change.