Chapter 774 - The Eight Hill

The pool of wood attribute spirit Qi in Lin Mu's Dantian was not as big as that of the fire elemental or the earth elemental pool, but it was still relatively big considering that the total capacity of Lin Mu's Dantian was ever expanding.

Cultivation in the Nascent soul realm didn't depend on how much spirit Qi on had their Dantian directly but instead depended on how grown the Nascent soul realm was. For most people, their Dantian capacity would not change after a certain point.

But Lin Mu was a big exception to that and had yet to see any sign of it stopping. He was at a point where he reckoned even if he was getting close to the full capacity of his Dantian, just as he was about to reach it, it would just expand even more to accommodate the spirit Qi.

Thus, even if the Wood attribute spirit Qi in his Dantian was just 3% of the total spirit Qi that he had, it might be equal to all the spirit Qi, a newly broken though Infant Soul stage Nascent soul realm cultivator might have.

Although Lin Mu's High Dantian capacity was also countered by his skills and techniques that used up a large amount of spirit Qi. While Flicker, Blink, and Phase were relatively light use for Lin Mu now and he could use them tens of thousands of times, it was not the same for Fade and Meld.

Fade consumed 1% of Lin Mu's total spirit Qi regardless of how much he had at this point. This was a complex point he only understood as a cost related to how his cultivation base grew and the equivalent energy needed to enter the parallel world.

As for Meld, its consumption was relative to how long and how much of an area Lin Mu controlled. If he controlled it for too long or too large of an area, the consumption would increase exponentially.

Though Senior Xukong had told him that if he could better his proficiency with the skill, he would be able to reduce the consumption even more. 

Then there were was the Boulder Collapsing Fist. Each form of it used either Vital energy or spirit Qi. And the quantity used could be varied as needed by Lin Mu. But the minimum number was still 1% of his total capacity.

As such, Lin Mu knew he had to keep these skills as his trumps cards. Even if his cultivation base grew, he couldn't just keep on using them blindly and expect to be fine. He would need to diversify his skills, and that was exactly why he was focused on bettering his body.

If just his body was strong enough to take all the hits and deal enough damage without even needing the spirit Qi, Lin Mu would be far more powerful. Thus, furthering his body cultivation was key to this.

The way he thought of it was that his Five Treasures realm cultivation base was now for general fights and long term sustained fights, while his spirit Qi cultivation would be for the specific situations where he could not deal with it using his body.

With his new path decided, Lin Mu now knew how to proceed. Before, he was moving a bit blindly on the path of cultivation. He knew that he had to defeat Gu Yao, but did not know how he would be fighting.

But now he knew it very well. All he needed to do was to keep on progressing and he'll be able to take the man down.

While pondering on all this, Lin Mu reached the six pointed lake with the cloud crowned banyan tree in the center of it.

"Here we are… the Eight Hill should be close from here now." Lin Mu said as he took a look around.

No matter how many times he looked, the lake certainly looked rather peculiar and so was the large tree in the center of it. Lin Mu spread his spirit sense around and checked the area in detail, just to ensure that everything was fine and safe.

~phew~

"Nothing different so far. That's a good sign." Lin Mu said and nodded his head.

"That's where the hill is, right?" Little Shrubby asked and pointed towards an area where three rows of hills could be seen. 

"Yup, that's the one. Let's head on to there." Lin Mu replied.

The two of them flew towards the three rows of hills and quickly found the one that was called as the Eight hill. It was in the shape of the Character 'Eight' and had a flat top with smoothly curving sides.

It was rather peculiar and Lin Mu guessed that it was actually made by someone to look like this. 

"This is strange… there is no spirit Qi here." Little Shrubby said upon feeling the air.

"What?" Lin Mu asked.

Little Shrubby was slightly ahead of him, but the distance between them was not that much, being a mere 100 meters. The place where Lin Mu was standing was normal and had the same concentration of spirit Qi as the rest of the area, thus he was confused upon hearing Little Shrubby.

He moved towards Little Shrubby and at the 50 meter mark, he sensed the change. As if the place was in a vacuum, the spirit Qi in the area was dead zero. Lin Mu could feel no spirit Qi at all in this part which was rather strange.

"What is this?" Lin Mu looked around and let his spirit sense wander.

They were currently in the center of the top of the Eight hill and it was only this area that was void of spirit Qi. Since Lin Mu could not sense anything in the air, he let his spirit sense pierce through the ground.

It did manage to enter up to a depth of a hundred meters into the hill, but after that, he felt a strong tug at his spirit sense.