For so ti after that, Xia Li did not wander around the palace aimlessly. Instead, following Kang Renquan's arrangents, he stayed in a side hall on the other side and read.This mobile sky palace may have been little more than a vehicle, but it was also the Holy Land's public face, and the palace quarters assigned to a Holy Son held no shortage of books.Most of the volus in the library hall were miscellanies, but many contained knowledge difficult to find elsewhere, such as the *Record of the Heavens Beyond*.Back at Lingxu Cave Heaven, Xia Li had already learned that anything concerning the world beyond the sky was treated as advanced knowledge. Not only did it require the ability to understand it, it also required status. Anyone without sufficient rank simply had no access to matters of the outer heavens.Because of that...even sothing as ordinary as a teorite, simply because it ca from beyond the sky, was wrapped in a layer of mystery."The Life-Nurturing Layer, the Mid-Cloud Layer, the Above-the-Clouds Layer, the Astral Wind Layer, the Spirit-Transformation Layer, and beyond them... the heavens beyond..."Xia Li leafed through the *Record of the Heavens Beyond*. The book advanced layer by layer, first introducing the five layers of the Xuan sky, in other words, the atmosphere of the Xuan Realm.Up through the Above-the-Clouds Layer, the descriptions were all rather ordinary, no different from the sky people saw every day.But once one reached the Astral Wind Layer, it was no longer an altitude ordinary cultivators could touch. Invisible, violent astral winds would tear apart anything that entered it. The Astral Wind Layer wrapped the Xuan Realm like a shield of storms, making it difficult for its people to reach the heavens beyond while also blocking teors from outside the sky.Beyond the Astral Wind Layer lay the Spirit-Transformation Layer, where a special kind of heavy spiritual energy existed. Cultivators found that heavy qi difficult to absorb and refine. rely coming into contact with it felt like plunging into the deep sea. The pressure of that heavy qi severely restricted movent, and those with low cultivation might even be crushed apart by it.[This planet is highly likely a rocky world approaching the theoretical size limit. Its outer atmosphere already displays so gas-giant characteristics.][Its planetary core most likely contains a spiritual-material layer that prevents the inner core from overheating, thereby preserving a solid surface.]The Heaven Chip offered a hypothesis, and Xia Li had more or less reached the sa conclusion himself. The Xuan Realm was simply too large. At a cultivator's normal pace, he could already far outstrip Earth's civilian airliners, yet crossing a single province still took at least half a month, while a passenger jet could circle Earth in two days.Xia Li therefore suspected that this world was at least twenty tis the size of Earth, likely larger. In the universe, planets of that scale were almost always gaseous.That made the Xuan Realm exceptionally special. If the spiritual-material layer around the core ever developed a problem, the world would beco a true gas giant. For the living beings of this realm, that would amount to an apocalypse."Sunlight has to pass through such a massive atmosphere to reach the ground. That alone shows the star this world orbits isn't so minor thing either."The afternoon sunlight of the Xuan Realm was brighter and more dazzling than Earth's, and its color was whiter as well.Xia Li kept reading through the *Record of the Heavens Beyond*, having the Heaven Chip record the information and then use Earth's theoretical knowledge to reverse-infer the environntal conditions of this world.Ti slipped away just like that. Xia Li beca a diligent porter of knowledge, summarizing the contents of those books and storing them all in the Heaven Chip's database.Spirit treasures, spirit plants, spirit ores, more detailed histories, the thousand demons and myriad beasts...Once that knowledge entered the Heaven Chip's database, Xia Li would no longer be completely ignorant whenever he encountered sothing unfamiliar. The Heaven Chip could imdiately pull up the relevant data and explain it to him.Only...while Xia Li was reading, the cave-heaven gourd kept twitching every so often. That was Qiu Fu inside protesting and asking when she would be allowed out.After being pestered one ti too many, Xia Li stepped out of the palace. Kang Renquan was indeed sitting cross-legged outside in serious, dutiful watch, truly guarding Xia Li's gate."Brother Kang, can you get in touch with Seventh Elder?""Of course. Do you need sothing from Seventh Elder?""Mm.""Then go ahead. I can pass the ssage along.""All right. You should know why that battle at Sunscorch Valley happened. The orphan of the White Tiger covert branch is still with . As for her... how does the Holy Land view her?"Xia Li was thinking about how Qiu Fu should be arranged."She'd be seen as your dependent, your spirit pet. More or less a buy-one-get-one-free bonus.""Can you really speak for the Holy Land on that?"
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"As the forr Ninth Holy Son, I'm quite confident in that judgnt. If humans are stronger than demons, then demons are beast pets and spirit pets. If demons are stronger than humans, then humans beco human pets. The Holy Land doesn't like seeing humans and demons standing on equal footing. You understand what I an. Of course, this is still just my guess...""You're special, and that tiger demon has sothing special about her too. In any case, the Holy Land won't do anything underhanded. If anything, the outco will probably be better than what I'm guessing."Kang Renquan was effectively offering Xia Li advice. If Xia Li wanted to bring Qiu Fu into the Holy Land as well, then at least in public, Qiu Fu had to appear as his spirit pet.After all, Taiyi Holy Land was humanity's Holy Land. Any demon beast permitted to appear within it could only be a subordinate of the human race."I understand."Xia Li nodded, then turned and went back into the palace. Only after shutting the doors tight and activating the anti-detection field did he enter the cave-heaven gourd.Inside the cave-heaven gourd, Qiu Fu was already so bored she was lying on the ground chewing grass. Only when she saw Xia Li enter did so life finally return to those dead-fish eyes of hers."So what's the situation now?""I'm on the way to Taiyi Holy Land. Unless sothing unexpected happens, I'll be staying there from now on. What about you? If you want to leave now, I can ask Lin Ye to look after you, or you can go back to Lingxu Cave Heaven. But if you want to keep following , then you'll have to wear a beast-control ring around your neck for a long ti.""Then put one on . I don't care about that. Demons are restricted everywhere when moving around among humans anyway.""Then you'll need to change the way you look now."Qiu Fu was too conspicuous in her current form. Even her eyebrows and eyelashes were snow-white."It's only shapeshifting. Not that serious. The White Tiger's power stays hidden until it erupts, and when it does, it kills. Even in the eyes of the great powers, I'm only a little demon with an incomplete bloodline. I have so value to raise, but not that much. My potential is greater than my current strength, but whether I'll ever truly awaken that bloodline is still unknown.""So far, only you've seen my true White Tiger form. If you don't say anything, nobody will know. Not even a great power at the Body Integration realm!"Qiu Fu was extrely confident in the White Tiger bloodline's ability to conceal its aura. She also understood Xia Li's current circumstances. As long as she maintained an image of being close to awakening her bloodline yet never quite able to cross that final threshold, it would be enough."Then I'll put a beast-control ring on you.""No need. A beast-control ring is just child's play for controlling minor demons. Since I'm going with you into humanity's Holy Land, I need to set those old fogies' minds at ease too. They need to feel that controlling you is the sa as controlling .""So...""let's form a blood contract."Qiu Fu proposed forming a blood contract with Xia Li. That was the real proof to outsiders that she was completely under his control."All right."Xia Li nodded. A tattoo-like blood-contract mark would look better than a beast-control ring anyway, and the ring was ugly and heavy besides. Qiu Fu would not be comfortable wearing it either.Soon after, the two of them took their positions.Xia Li stood as the master, Qiu Fu as the subordinate. She knelt on one knee before him and guided him through the formation of the blood contract.First, she forced out a drop of heart's blood containing a seed of her Divine Soul and rged it into Xia Li's body.Then she bit open the tip of Xia Li's finger and gently held it between her teeth. An abstruse mark imdiately surfaced on the back of his hand. At the sa ti, an identical blood-red imprint appeared at her throat.Not long after the mark ford, it quickly faded, but it remained distinct enough to prove the subordinate bond between her and Xia Li."All right. I've acknowledged you as my master now. Can you let go out and look around?""Sure."Xia Li nodded. This was the kind of relationship he and Qiu Fu had. Qiu Fu never doubted him, and naturally he would never do her harm."Oh, right. This contract is a life-and-death blood contract. If you die, I die with you. If I die, it won't affect you in the slightest. So from now on, you'd better be careful. If you insist on getting yourself killed, co dissolve the contract with first.""Or...""We can die together. I can fight beside you and die beside you, but I don't want to be dragged into death by the blood contract. That would be way too frustrating."When Qiu Fu said this, there was not the slightest fear of death in her.Perhaps it was her bloodline. The White Tiger clan had never feared death. If anything, the closer they ca to it, the more earth-shaking a power they could unleash. White Tigers were practically synonymous with the desperate counterattack before death.
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