Chapter 183
The next day dawned, but her mind was still filled entirely with the Lesser Realm.
Baek Cheong lay facedown on her bed, wiggling only her fingers.
Her thoughts kept multiplying, one after another.
If it was a fragment of the Spirit Realm, how had it fallen away?
Why had that fallen fragment ended up lodged in the very heart of the Lower Realm?
What lay beyond the boundary wall that even Nascent Soul grand cultivators could not cross?
Nothing was getting resolved cleanly.
Yet it wasn't as though she could cross over herself and see for herself.
‘If only I could hear the details from someone.’
It was around then, as she rubbed her chin against her hapless pillow.
Suddenly, the saying that it was darkest beneath the lamp flashed through her mind.
‘Wait... Hyeonjin Sect is in the Central Continent, isn't it?’
Hyeonjin Sect, where her Second Older Brother had studied for more than a decade before returning.
It was a sect rooted in none other than the Central Continent.
In other words, there were two people from the Lesser Realm living in her clan.
One was her Second Older Brother, Baek Sang.
The other was Hyunheo Zhenren, the sect master of Hyeonjin Sect.
‘Hyunheo Zhenren won't do.’
Baek Cheong shook her head the moment she thought of him.
He was a Nascent Soul grandmaster.
Even cautiously sounding him out could be called dangerous.
One wrong word could give him some excuse to turn on her.
Besides, he was already itching to teach her formations.
If she showed interest in the Lesser Realm, he would surely seize her by the wrist and insist on giving her a tour of Hyeonjin Sect.
So the only approachable person was her Second Older Brother.
But one thing bothered her.
At the end, her Second Older Brother had looked half out of his mind.
After all, it was as if the master he had served for more than a decade had been stolen away from him by her.
‘What if I go ask him and he starts crying?’
At this rate, she was worried whether she could even hear the answer she wanted in full.
But she couldn't put it off forever.
She opened the Nameless Forum just in case, but couldn't concentrate, and the words refused to sink in.
Rather than plotting a disturbance, even reading a single reply brought the Lesser Realm to mind.
‘At this rate, I won't be able to browse the forum or do anything.’
Baek Cheong logged off and got to her feet.
She had to resolve her curiosity first before she could focus on browsing or anything else.
***
Her Second Older Brother's quarters were in the eastern part of the inner compound.
But the closer she got, the raucous noise came to greet her first.
When she rounded the corner, a construction site sprawled right before her eyes.
Workers hurried back and forth, remodeling one side of the building.
Some were up on the roof removing the tiles.
Meanwhile, carts loaded with jade-green bamboo were being brought in beneath the wall.
‘Jade Bamboo?’
The workers carefully transplanted the Jade Bamboo throughout the garden.
Yet as she watched quietly, her eyes narrowed of their own accord.
The spacing between the Jade Bamboo, the direction in which the water channels turned...
Not a single part of the arrangement had been decided carelessly.
Once completed, the quarters and garden would harmonize to naturally form an array.
An array that filtered turbid qi day and night, leaving behind only clean air and spiritual qi.
It was the skill of crafting an array from nothing but the terrain and vegetation, without even creating an array core.
It was an array that could not even be imitated without considerable mastery of formations.
Then a familiar voice rang out from the middle of the construction site.
“Not there! The Jade Bamboo has to be planted beside the waterway first!”
It was her Second Older Brother, Baek Sang.
With his sleeves rolled up, he was busily moving among the workers.
Wherever he pointed with his fingertips, the workers moved in perfect unison.
‘So he hadn't spent all those years at Hyeonjin Sect for nothing.’
Baek Cheong nodded inwardly.
His years of study had clearly not been wasted.
Come to think of it, before she had begun to distinguish herself, he had been hailed as the Yeonha Baek Clan's prodigy.
But worried about what had happened at the exchange gathering, she cautiously approached and spoke to him.
“Second Older Brother.”
“Ohhh, Cheong-ah!”
Baek Sang beamed and hurried over.
“What brings you all the way here?”
“I was passing by and heard all the noise, so I came to take a look.”
Contrary to her worries, warmth dripped from his voice.
Far from looking out of his mind, his complexion was brighter than ever.
‘Thank goodness. He's fine.’
Just as she began to relax, Baek Sang continued with a pleased expression.
“It's good you came. Aren't we fellow disciples under the same master now? We're siblings as well as master and disciple, so you should come by and show your face often.”
“...What?”
Baek Cheong blinked, and Baek Sang added in a serious tone.
“Since Master took you in, doesn't that make you my junior sister?”
Baek Cheong couldn't immediately think of a reply.
‘So that's how he decided to look at it...’
The misfortune of having his master take her in had somehow turned into the happy fortune of gaining a junior sister.
Whatever rationalization he had completed, his face was entirely free of gloom.
There was no reason to correct him.
If thinking whatever made him happy counted as a blessing, then it was a blessing.
Since there was nothing to gain from talking for long, she swiftly changed the subject.
“By the way, why are you renovating the quarters so extensively?”
“Ah, Master said he would be staying with the clan for a long while. So I'm arranging quarters for him similar to the ones he had at Hyeonjin Sect.”
Baek Sang answered proudly as he looked around the construction site.
Baek Cheong nearly failed to keep her expression under control.
‘Is it really all right for the sect master to be away this long?’
The head of a sect settling down in someone else's clan.
The disciples of Hyeonjin Sect would be reduced to wailing.
But she pushed those feelings aside for the moment.
Because a topic perfect for opening the way had just rolled right to her.
“Is Hyeonjin Sect really that different from our clan?”
She slipped the question in without missing her chance.
Baek Sang poured out an explanation as if he had been waiting for it.
“Different? Of course it is. The Heaven and Earth spiritual qi encompassing all of Hyeonjin Sect is at the level of a second-grade spiritual vein. And it isn't merely abundant—the quality is extraordinary as well. I suppose you could call it a place where one cultivates simply by breathing.”
Baek Cheong's eyes grew round.
Her clan had only just gone to great lengths to connect a second-grade spiritual vein to her cave abode.
Yet an entire sect being surrounded by Heaven and Earth spiritual qi of the same grade meant there was no comparison to be made.
“Is Hyeonjin Sect the only place that's special?”
She naturally followed up with her next question.
Baek Sang shook his head.
“The Central Continent as a whole is practically one enormous grotto-heaven blessed land. Wherever you go, the Heaven and Earth spiritual qi is at the level of a second-grade spiritual vein. But the place where our sect is located is one of the finest blessed lands even among them, and the Profound Spirit Purification Array (玄靈淨化陣) filters out turbid qi day and night, so its level is something else entirely.”
Baek Cheong quietly assessed Baek Sang's cultivation.
‘Late-stage Foundation Establishment...’
Her Second Older Brother was seven years younger than her First Older Brother.
Yet he had already reached the late stage of Foundation Establishment.
Clearly, spending more than a decade in a place like that had done him a world of good.
But what she wanted to know lay elsewhere.
She didn't care much about Hyeonjin Sect or blessed lands.
“Surely our sect's boasts aren't limited to its spiritual qi. The hundred and eight steps leading into the mountain gate each contain an array, so even climbing them washes away the turbid qi from your mind and body. And the body-protection array spread across the training grounds won't suffer a single scratch even when the senior disciples exchange blows with all their might. One of my senior brothers once gained sudden enlightenment while climbing the steps and spent three days standing there.”
Yet the conversation kept veering into praise of Hyeonjin Sect.
The arrays at the mountain gate, the skill of the senior disciples...
Baek Cheong dutifully chimed in and gradually redirected the flow.
From Hyeonjin Sect toward the Central Continent.
“Then is there a lot to see in the Central Continent besides Hyeonjin Sect?”
After repeating questions like that several times, the answer she wanted finally slipped out.
“Ah, the Central Continent is generally full of fascinating things. Someone once said it's broader than all four continents put together, and there are so many secret realms and ruins that they can't be counted. And in the central region, phenomena beyond imagination are everywhere.”
Baek Sang paused there, then lowered his voice further.
“Master also said there's a strong possibility that spiritual veins surpassing the fifth grade exist in the central region. He said the Venerables guard them, so no one dares even peek.”
Baek Cheong was left dumbfounded.
The more she heard, the more tangled the story became.
Just then, a worker from over there called urgently to Baek Sang.
“There you go, trying to plant Jade Bamboo in the wrong spot again.”
Baek Sang turned around with an apologetic expression.
“Cheong-ah, let's finish our talk another time.”
“Yes. I'll be going now, Brother.”
Baek Cheong politely bid him farewell and withdrew.
Then, all the way back to her quarters, she mulled over what she had heard.
Land broader than all four continents combined.
Countless secret realms and ruins.
Spiritual veins beyond the fifth grade, and Venerables who guarded those veins.
Even amid her bewilderment, she became certain of one thing.
‘The Lesser Realm really must be a fragment of the Spirit Realm.’
Even if there was no way to know how it had fallen away from the Spirit Realm.
There was no way the Lesser Realm could simply be part of the Mortal Realm.
And just as certainty settled in, gooseflesh prickled across her entire body.
‘Then the four continents...’
They were likely Lower Realms that had been drawn into the Lesser Realm for some reason.
It was also highly likely that even their size, too small to count as a single Lower Realm, had been lost during the process of merging them together.
If so, every circumstance pointed to one conclusion.
‘If I go to another continent, might my realm number change too?’
At this, Baek Cheong rejoiced at the prospect of a legitimate(?) way to change her realm number.
Whether there were double-digit numbers of Incarnation cultivators who had failed to ascend, Venerables included.
Whether the Dongcheon Sansu Alliance on the Eastern Continent was plotting independence.
Those were all matters with no direct connection to her.