As the distance closed, Jaekyung was able to instantly gauge the cultivation levels of the twenty-odd water bandits.
‘Six in the early Qi Refining Stage. Fifteen in the middle stage. And two in the late stage?’
While Jaekyung was briefly contemplating, a few of them dove into the water. Judging by the energy he felt, they seemed to be people who had learned cultivation techniques. They were not as skilled as the aquatic spirit beasts, but they moved quite adeptly in the water.
However, perhaps because of the nearby aquatic spirit beasts, they did not stray far from their boat. They would explore the water for a short while, but if an aquatic spirit beast seemed to approach, they would immediately return to the boat, repeating this pattern.
“Dragon Lord?”
As Jaekyung, who had been moving so fast it was dizzying, suddenly stopped, the turtle was puzzled.
“There are humans.”
“Yes? Ah, it must be those water bandit scoundrels.”
The turtle did not doubt Jaekyung's words. In its mind, the flood dragon was a being with abilities beyond its imagination, even if not omnipotent. Even if he saw what it could not see and felt what it could not feel, that was only natural.
“Dragon Lord. Are you going to wipe out those human scoundrels?”
The turtle asked, trying its best to hide its anticipation. Hidden within was a small hope that if the Dragon Lord wiped out the water bandits, a few of them might fall to it as its share. After all, a few humans with mediocre Cultivation wouldn't even be worth the Dragon Lord's notice.
‘What should I do.’
Jaekyung pondered.
Those fellows, who seemed to be water bandits, didn't appear to have any significant backing, but one never knew. Besides, his original goal was to find a potential treasure deep in the lake, not to hunt humans. Of course, he had no intention of refusing extra income, but if it ended up stirring up trouble...
“Forget it.”
“Yes, sir.”
The turtle tried its best to hide its disappointment. It was a master of knowing its place. It knew instinctively when to open its mouth and when to keep it shut.
“Dragon Lord. It's that way.”
Jaekyung moved without rest in the direction the turtle pointed. Nothing stood in their way. Not only the aquatic spirit beasts, but even the unintelligent creatures of the water instinctively sensed danger and moved away from them.
Seeing this, the turtle made a fuss, praising the ‘Dragon Lord's majesty’ over and over. At first, Jaekyung found the words embarrassing, but after hearing them repeatedly, it didn't seem so bad, so he just let it chatter away.
“It is there, Dragon Lord.”
The place the turtle pointed to. There was a massive current there. Even from a distance, one could feel its sharpness.
Water currents like blades swirled ceaselessly, blocking all approach. The area covered by the current was quite vast, so from afar, it felt as if some kind of boundary had been drawn. A boundary that warned and stopped those who tried to descend deeper.
‘Indeed, if it's like that, I can understand why it's not easily approached.’
Needless to say, the land-dwelling humans, even the aquatic spirit beasts living in the water, would not dare to brave such a terrifying current to go down.
‘It's certainly not ordinary.’
The current was one thing, but as Jaekyung looked at it, he also saw what was beyond it. The distance was great, but it was clearly visible to Jaekyung's eyes. Up to the point that seemed to be the center of the current, it was no different from where they were now, but beyond it was different.
Leaving aside other things, for one, the water itself was a deeper shade of blue and teeming with life. So much so that it wouldn't be strange to mistake it for a spiritual land at first glance.
“Do you know what lies beyond that current?”
“My apologies, Dragon Lord. I have heard this and that, but none of it is believable. Some say it's the scar from a Heavenly Thunder so great it covered the entire Western Twin Lake, others say the father of the Shattered Waters Whale King is in a deep slumber below and that is his breathing... uh, and also…”
“That is enough.”
Jaekyung watched the current and approached cautiously. As he descended to a certain point, he began to feel a pulling force. It was still at a level not even worth a yawn, but it seemed it would grow quite strong if he continued down.
‘Still, this should be no problem.’
Having roughly gauged the current's strength, Jaekyung steeled his resolve and closed his mouth.
“Uh, uh? Dragon Lord?”
“Stay inside for a moment.”
Ignoring the turtle's panicked voice, Jaekyung, with his mouth shut, charged powerfully toward the current. Rumble- The moment the pulling force grew strong enough to be bothersome, blade-like torrents of water battered Jaekyung's body.
‘It's quite formidable.’
To him, it was merely a sharp sting, but since such impacts came in succession, without pause, it was highly likely that any ordinary aquatic spirit beast caught in this current wouldn't even leave its bones behind.
“Urgh.”
The current was massive. It was on a scale that it nearly divided the waters of the lakebed into upper and lower sections, so even when Jaekyung cut through the water with all his might, it took quite some time to pass through.
This meant he had no choice but to be relentlessly battered during that time, so by the time he had nearly escaped the current, a suppressed groan finally escaped Jaekyung's lips.
‘Tsk. This is worse than I thought.’
Just a moment ago, I thought an ordinary aquatic spirit beast wouldn't even leave its bones behind... I take it back. Even an extraordinary aquatic spirit beast would be turned into chunks of meat.
Even a Great Spirit Beast, if it wasn't the sturdy type, would surely be wailing in pain. The current was of that level. The torrent was one thing, but it was also wider and spread deeper than it appeared from above, making it difficult to escape.
It was only because Jaekyung's body was sturdy that it ended with just a slight groan.
“Ugh... Dragon Lord. What happened to me? My head, my head is so dizzy.”
When Jaekyung opened his mouth and spat out the turtle, it clutched its head and spun around.
“It's because you were shaken by the current. You will be fine in a little while.”
The current was terrifying, but the turtle was no ordinary turtle, but a spirit beast, so it soon recovered.
“Dragon Lord. Is this place perhaps...”
“It is beyond the current.”
Without even telling the turtle to wait here, Jaekyung descended further. The turtle hurriedly followed behind him, and seeing Jaekyung's focused expression, it tactfully kept its mouth shut.
‘There is definitely something down there. It's faint, but I can feel it. But what is this energy? Is it water energy?’
Perhaps due to the influence of the current, the surrounding terrain was shaped like a round crater. The water energy Jaekyung felt came from the very center of this huge pit. Could it be that the current was formed due to the influence of the water energy inside?
But if so, isn't the energy I feel too faint?
‘I'll know when I see it.’
Surely it can't be that the Shattered Waters Whale King's father, a giant whale, is actually snoring down there, right? Jaekyung momentarily entertained the unamusing thought and activated his Aura Concealment Art to its fullest. Then he spoke to the turtle, who did not know the Aura Concealment Art.
“You stay here.”
“Yes, sir.”
The turtle stopped in its tracks without a second word. Jaekyung glanced at the relieved creature and quickly descended. As he went further down toward the bottom, the light faded, and a deep darkness greeted him.
Except for the water temperature remaining the same, he could have mistaken it for entering the deep sea.
‘That is...’
Jaekyung's eyes easily pierced through the darkness, and at the same time, his spiritual awareness read the energy of what he saw. Divine sense was an ability that could be called a superior version of spiritual awareness, but for reading energy in detail up close like this, spiritual awareness was more accurate than divine sense.
His spiritual awareness, which he had trained countless times before and had become even more sensitive upon reaching the Great Spirit stage. That spiritual awareness told him that the shimmering lakebed spread out before him was all ore imbued with water energy.
‘It's not spirit stone. It's similar to crystal... but no, that's not it either.’
Jaekyung, who had personally seen and even eaten a Fire Crystal, could be certain. Those ores were lacking to be called crystals. They felt like something that had tried to become a crystal but failed.
‘It's a bit awkward to mine, too.’
The difference between a complete spirit stone and a lesser ore is whether it can stably maintain the spiritual energy it contains. Such an incomplete ore would immediately start losing its spiritual energy the moment it is separated from the ore vein, so there's no point in mining it.
Therefore, the best course of action would be to stay here and absorb the spiritual energy, but the current Jaekyung had no way to absorb spiritual energy, and to make matters worse, it was water energy.
His spiritual nature carried fire energy, so absorbing water energy would be extremely inefficient, or in the worst-case scenario, it would even harm his spiritual nature.
‘It's not worth much, but a shame to discard.’
Jaekyung swallowed his disappointment and looked around to see if there was anything else. However, he had already confirmed through his spiritual awareness that there was nothing special here besides that ore vein. Nevertheless, the act of turning his head and rolling his eyes was merely an expression of his lingering disappointment.
‘That turtle fellow said there were a few more places like this, so I'll just have to hope for a harvest at the other spots.’
Just as he was about to turn away with a bitter taste in his mouth. Something caught Jaekyung's eye.
‘Hm?’
In truth, it was nothing special. It was just a slightly thick patch of dirt laid in the middle of the ore vein. But strangely, that ordinary dirt, or more precisely, the ores around that dirt, caught Jaekyung's attention.
If he wasn't mistaken, the water energy in the ores around the dirt was particularly faint compared to the ores elsewhere. The energy was so faint that he had almost mistaken them for ordinary rocks.
‘What is this?’
His interest piqued, Jaekyung moved closer to the dirt to examine it.
‘Earth energy? It's faint... but it's not dispersing.’
It does not disperse. This is the same property as a spirit stone. However, the energy of this dirt was incredibly faint.
So faint that you wouldn't feel it unless you looked at it up close.
‘Hm?’
Jaekyung, who was observing the dirt so closely he was almost burying his head in it, felt the earth energy from the dirt flare up slightly before immediately scattering. The earth energy of the dirt had tried to suppress the water energy of the ore vein, only to be suppressed itself.
But it wasn't suppressed for nothing; in the process, the water energy of the ore vein also diminished, albeit minutely.
‘Could this be...’
Jaekyung clearly watched the process of the earth and water energies clashing and canceling each other out. He thought he now understood why this ore vein looked the way it did.
‘Five Elements in conflict. The earth energy contained in this dirt has been constantly depleting the ore vein's water energy over a long time.’
He wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it with his own eyes. But since he saw it, he had to believe. This is no ordinary dirt.
It wouldn't be wrong to consider it a type of spirit crystal in the form of dirt. One that even possessed some ability to recover spiritual energy. If this dirt hadn't been interfering here, even if a spirit vein was too much to ask for, a spiritual land rich with water energy might have formed.
‘This is definitely a spiritual object. And it's likely a rather valuable one at that.’
The ores that had failed to become spirit crystals were no longer in his sight. Now, only the widely scattered dirt entered Jaekyung's eyes. He must, absolutely must, take all of this dirt with him.
‘But... how do I carry it?’
If it were ore, I could somehow hold it with my tail or something and take it, but how am I supposed to carry dirt? Should I hold it in my mouth? If it were ordinary dirt, that might work, but isn't this dirt a spiritual object?
What if it melts in my mouth or goes into my stomach? This dirt is a spiritual object; what if it gets digested in my stomach? Of course, a spiritual object would be good for the body, but right now, he wasn't looking to nourish himself but to find capital to use for a transaction.
But it would be a problem if the capital gets digested, wouldn't it?
“Hmm.”
He wracked his brain, but no particularly good ideas came to mind. As he was pondering his predicament, he suddenly thought of the turtle waiting up above.
‘Perhaps that fellow might have a good idea?’
He didn't have high expectations. It was just that the creature knew a lot of things, so he wondered if it might know something.
“Turtle. There is something I need to take with me, but I don't have a good way to transport it. Do you have any good ideas?”
“Eh... if you say something, what kind of...?”
“It is dirt. Spiritual soil.”
“Spiritual soil?”
But in response to his question, asked without much expectation, the turtle blinked its eyes and then subtly lifted its head to look up. Then it cautiously opened its mouth.
“Um... Dragon Lord. I once heard that among the human scoundrels, there are some who possess treasures that can store many things.”
Hearing those words, Jaekyung's eyes lit up.
‘This turtle fellow. I'm starting to like him.’
Jaekyung looked with satisfaction at the turtle, which had its webbed feet together and was maintaining a polite posture. The turtle, with its head bowed, trembled anxiously under Jaekyung's intense gaze, but Jaekyung paid it no mind.
“Turtle.”
“Yes! Dragon Lord.”
Jaekyung opened his mouth wide.
“Get in.”
“Yes. Yes.......”
With a mournful expression, the turtle climbed onto Jaekyung's large tongue.
“You'd better hold on tight.”
“Hold on tight, you say?”
The mouth closed, and the turtle's voice was cut off. Soon after, as Jaekyung's body shot upwards rapidly, a faint, undignified scream leaked out from within his tightly shut mouth.