Cultivation is just so scientific! Chapter 1388: 740: Sea of Flowers (Part 2)

Li Yuanba watched as the sea of petals, which had previously drifted like a soft breeze, transformed into a ferocious gale with every chain reaction.

The sharp whistling of petals cutting through the air filled his ears, as each delicate leaf became a lethal blade.

Several petals breached the five-meter perimeter of the dual force fields created by the ‘Invisible Primordial Magnetism’ and the gravity of the ‘Ten Thousand Sword Peak’ hovering above. Upon entry, the petals began to drift along the magnetic lines of the ‘Invisible Primordial Magnetism’ field.

The gravity field, however, proved ineffective against them. While the petals struggled to injure Li Yuanba, the influence of the ‘Invisible Primordial Magnetism’ was less potent than he had hoped.

Reaching out, he caught a petal between two fingers as it traversed the magnetic field.

The moment he touched it, he realized the petal was not physical matter, but a unique manifestation of Gold Element Energy. Within it, he detected a faint trace of rule enhancement.

This perception was possible because Li Shiming’s main body had cultivated the ‘Heavenly Human Technique,’ providing a reference for IBMz15 to analyze the Gold Rules to a certain degree.

With the assistance of IBMz15, even as a Nascent Soul Middle Stage Sword Cultivator who had yet to master rule perception, he could conclude that these petals were driven by the Gold Rules.

In a sense, petals bolstered by the Gold Rules attained an offensive power comparable to that of a Great Cultivator.

Though the Gold Rules within a single petal were incredibly sparse, any attack infused with the power of rules occupied an entirely different realm of lethality.

It was only because his ‘Invisible Primordial Magnetism’ was exceptionally effective against gold-attributed substances and energy—and functioned as a divine ability that touched upon the power of rules—that it could influence the petals at all.

Li Yuanba dared not be careless. He immediately expanded the ‘Invisible Primordial Magnetism’ field from the ‘Ten Thousand Sword Peak,’ projecting a force field with a thousand-meter radius.

Every petal within that range began to fly in strange patterns, guided by the invisible lines of the magnetic field.

He had to constantly manipulate the force lines; otherwise, the petals would follow the magnetic paths to every point within the thousand-meter zone, potentially striking him since he stood at the center.

Fortunately, his mastery over ‘Invisible Primordial Magnetism’ was absolute. He activated his personal divine ability, establishing a secondary five-meter ‘Invisible Primordial Magnetism’ barrier around his body.

Now shielded by two layers of force fields, he kept the swirling petals trapped within the outer thousand-meter zone.

Through careful isolation, not a single petal could penetrate the final five-meter gap of his personal defense.

He shook his head, feeling a sense of relief that he had entered alone. Any other Nascent Soul Middle Stage Cultivation practitioner would likely have been ground into dust by this floral storm instantly.

Now that his safety was guaranteed, he took a moment to study the sea of flowers.

He noted a striking resemblance between these petals and the energy-based flying swords generated by the ‘Ten Thousand Sword Peak’.

Both utilized energy conversion, both launched swarms of flying blades, and both relied on overwhelming numbers to defeat foes.

Regrettably, these petals could not be harvested; otherwise, he would have loved to take some back for analysis.

Even the golden blossoms rooted in the soil were inseparable from the earth. Even with his Divine Sense, he found it impossible to collect a single flower.

For thirty minutes, he traversed the sea of flowers using Sword Escape. For any other cultivator, this distance would have been a death march.

Instead, he moved through the radiant landscape like a traveler admiring the scenery.

His ‘Divine Eye’ eventually pierced through the endless fluttering petals to see the edge of the field.

As he exited the sea of flowers, the petals dancing in the air suddenly froze. They vanished instantly, and the bare stalks behind him immediately bloomed with new petals.

The entire sea of flowers reverted to its pristine state in a heartbeat, as if the peace had never been disturbed.

Li Yuanba sighed. This type of automated recovery was not unheard of; many high-level Artifact Refining Masters utilized similar mechanisms.

The scale, however, was staggering. Given the infinite number of flowers here, if Artifact Refining Masters had to forge each one individually, thousands of them would have worked themselves to death.

He could not conceive how the Langcai Great Power had achieved this; the capabilities of such beings were far beyond his current horizon.

He could only marvel at the sight. Every flower functioned like a magical treasure imbued with rule power. Had the rule power been slightly stronger, they would have possessed the might of Spirit Treasures.

Of course, this was only due to the presence of Gold Rules, but the actual strength of a single petal was far inferior to a genuine Spirit Treasure.

Comparing them to his life-bound Xingyi Sword, the rule power within his Speed Rule Imprint was vastly superior to that of these petals when fully activated.

The fact that the petals didn't even manifest a Gold Rules Imprint proved how diluted the power of rules was within them.

Nevertheless, if enough of these rule-enhanced petals gathered together, even a Great Cultivator would struggle to survive.

Li Yuanba felt an urge to stay and investigate these strange flowers further.

But that thought vanished when he spotted several dark silhouettes rapidly closing in through the sea of flowers.

The Grotto Heaven Guardians were not targeted by the flowers; they marched across the field without a single petal lifting to attack them.

Realizing he could not stay, Li Yuanba turned and crossed through another spatial barrier.

As he passed through the barrier this time, he felt a ripple of spatial energy, signaling a short-range teleportation.

He emerged at the start of an avenue paved with golden bricks. On either side stood golden statues, each unique, representing various cultivators holding different magical treasures.

Despite their uniform golden hue, their expressions were hauntingly lifelike, as though living people had been turned into stone.

Furthermore, spatial barriers blocked the way to the left, right, and above, forcing any traveler to remain on the golden path.

Li Yuanba attempted to use Sword Escape to move quickly, but the moment he rose above the golden bricks, a flight-restricting ward activated, slamming him back to the ground.

He frowned. Under normal circumstances, such wards did not interfere with ground-level Sword Escape.

Walking and low-altitude Sword Escape were essentially the same, yet even that was prohibited here.

He tested the flight of his Spirit Treasure Xingyi Sword and was relieved to find it unaffected. Had the sword been restricted, it would have stripped a Sword Cultivator of their primary combat strength.

“It seems I am forced to walk,” he mused with a touch of annoyance.

He had only taken a few steps when he suddenly turned his gaze toward a pair of statues by the path.

The previously inanimate objects began to radiate a pulse of Spiritual Power as he drew near.

He watched as the statues' eyes shifted. Their rigid golden forms softened into a liquid-like state, and the pair of figures surged into motion.

He realized these two statues were modeled after Sword Cultivators. Upon awakening, a portion of their liquid gold bodies flowed upward, shaping into flying swords that hovered above them.

Li Yuanba’s skin crawled as he felt the sharp Sword Intent radiating from the statues' weapons.

The most alarming realization was that this Sword Intent reached the level of a Great Cultivator.

He was intimately familiar with that level of power; the ‘Ten Thousand Sword Peak’ contained over ten energy swords that possessed Great Cultivator Sword Intent.

This meant he was now facing two opponents with the combat strength of Great Cultivator level Sword Cultivators.

His face darkened with gravity as he stared at the liquid gold Sword Cultivators. He glanced at the long rows of statues stretching down the road, and a chill ran down his spine.

“Were these statues once living cultivators?” he wondered, a grim suspicion forming in his mind.