They had left in a hurry. The teleportation array had been activated under duress. There had been no ti to ask about travel duration, stabilization cycles, or spatial current alignnt.
Daoist Chu stroked his beard thoughtfully.
"From old records," he said slowly, "a journey to the Fox Scion World should take roughly four to six months under normal conditions."
ng Bai frowned. "Should?"
Daoist Chu nodded. "The array was activated hastily. Power redirection, ergency stabilization, and forced alignnt all introduce variables. There is a chance the spatial currents are not optimal."
Elyon added, "Which could stretch the travel ti."
"Yes," Daoist Chu agreed. "It might take longer."
Lin Mu listened quietly.
Four to six months.
Possibly more.
He exhaled and closed his eyes, allowing the Qi gathering arrays of the Mobile Courtyard to begin their work, drawing power from the large chunks of Immortal Stones Lin Mu had set in their storage. Immortal Qi flowed gently into him, soothing the strain on his ridians and calming the residual tension in his mind.
"Then we rest," Lin Mu said calmly.
He opened his eyes, his expression already returning to its usual composed state.
"This journey is not over yet."
Two weeks passed quietly within the Spatial Channel.
Ti flowed strangely here.
There was no sun to rise or set, no wind to mark the passage of hours. Only the endless rivers of distorted darkness with occasional flashes of spatial energy outside the Mobile Courtyard hinted that they were still moving, drifting
steadily toward the distant Fox Scion World.
As always, the group fell into a familiar rhythm.
ng Bai trained every day without exception. His mornings were spent cultivating, stabilizing his realm, and refining his understanding of Formation Dao under Daoist Chu's guidance.
His afternoons were far less pleasant, as Cattaleya took over. Sparring with her was never gentle, and while she held back enough to not cripple him, she did not spare him pain.
Bruises, exhaustion, and shattered confidence were common, but so was improvent. His movents beca sharper. His reactions faster. His ability to combine formations into combat steadily improved.
Daoist Chu hovered between instructor and observer, correcting ng Bai's mistakes with a sharp tongue while secretly approving of his progress. Occasionally, he would step in to demonstrate a formation principle, drawing glowing lines of Qi in the air that left ng Bai scrambling to keep up.
Little Shrubby mostly watched from the sidelines, sotis offering comntary that was entirely unhelpful, other tis providing blunt insights that oddly hit the mark. When bored, he cooked. When inspired, he experinted with new ingredients gathered from their previous travels.
The twins ca and went, sotis cultivating, sotis playing in the Sleepscape, sotis simply coiling atop the courtyard roofs to nap. Since the incident in the forest, they had been quieter, more alert.
They still trusted Lin Mu completely, but they had learned a lesson about restraint and the cost of underestimating human greed.
Yet despite all of this activity, Lin Mu did not join them.
For the first ti in a long while, he withdrew from active teaching and sparring.
Instead, he focused inward.
More specifically, on the Water Core.
The mont he had raised the waters of an entire city, sothing had shifted. At the ti, his mind had been consud by urgency and control, but once the danger had passed, the aftertaste of that experience lingered. It was like standing before a door he had unknowingly pushed open, only to realize there was a vast space beyond it that he could not yet fully see.
It was close.
Painfully close.
But still veiled in fog.
Lin Mu sat cross legged in the central pavilion room of the Mobile Courtyard, eyes closed, his breathing steady. His immortal sense was turned inward, tracing the flow of Qi through his ridians, organs, and cores.
The Water Core rotated calmly, its surface shimring like a deep, endless sea. Compared to his other cores, it felt gentle. It did not roar with destructive intent like fire, nor did it crush with overwhelming pressure like Earth. And yet, its presence was pervasive, subtle, and endlessly adaptable.
After the battle in Three Union City, Lin Mu had already confird that his control over water had increased dramatically. Precision, range, responsiveness, all of it had improved. But he knew that was only the surface.
The Water Core was not rely about controlling external water.
It was about life.
Flow.
Purification.
Balance.
The physical changes had been the first clue.
Over the past two weeks, Lin Mu had noticed clear differences in his body. His endurance had improved, but not in the explosive way that Wood or Earth provided. Instead, it was smooth and sustained. His recovery rate had increased. Fatigue faded faster. Even minor internal imbalances corrected themselves naturally over ti.
After careful observation, he pinpointed the cause.
His kidneys.
They were functioning at a level far beyond what they had before. Lin Mu
estimated at least ten tis their previous efficiency. Blood filtration, electrolyte balance, toxin removal, all of it had reached an absurd level of
optimization.
This alone explained why his tabolism had accelerated. Impurities that would normally linger were expelled almost imdiately. Even residues from high grade pills and elixirs were broken down more cleanly.
But that still did not explain everything.
There was more.
Lin Mu began experinting.
He started with sothing simple.
Water.
He drank a cup slowly, focusing entirely on the process. His immortal sense followed the liquid from the mont it entered his mouth.
At first, everything seed normal. The water passed through his throat, flowing toward his stomach. But then Lin Mu noticed sothing strange. Before the water even reached his stomach, nearly half of it vanished.
Not physically.
It transford.
The mont the water touched his internal Qi pathways, a portion of it was instantly converted into Water Qi. This conversion did not occur in the stomach or intestines, but along his ridians themselves, as if his body recognized the presence of water and absorbed its essence directly.
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