SSS-Rank 10x Reward System: Accepting Disciples to Live Forever-Chapter 190: Spark
The same treasure.
The same opportunity.
And their destinies would still diverge like rivers flowing in opposite directions.
In the end, it all boiled down to one thing.
Mindset.
How far was someone willing to go?
What were they willing to endure?
How deeply did they desire transcendence?
Time moved forward.
The following day, beneath solemn gazes and quiet anticipation, the Sect Master began instructing his two sons.
The cultivation hall was filled with incense smoke. Sunlight streamed through carved lattice windows, illuminating drifting dust motes that danced in the air.
"Close your eyes," the Sect Master instructed gently. "Feel the qi in the air. It is everywhere. Between your breaths. In the wind. In your blood."
Rin closed his eyes.
His heart pounded.
He focused.
And almost instantly—
A thread.
A faint, cool sensation brushed against his senses.
Qi.
He caught it.
Guided it.
Drew it inward.
A wisp of spiritual energy slipped into his meridians.
Gasps echoed softly through the hall.
"He sensed it!"
"So quickly!"
"A true heaven-blessed genius!"
The Sect Master’s usually calm face lit up with pride.
And just like that, Rin stepped onto the cultivation path.
Days passed.
Then weeks.
Rin’s cultivation rose like a rocket.
Every day, his qi grew denser. His control sharpened. His techniques improved at a pace that left elders speechless.
He advanced with shocking speed.
By now, the entire sect revolved around him.
Wherever he went, eyes followed.
Praise poured in like rain.
"Young Master Rin’s meridians are flawless."
"His spiritual roots respond instantly."
"He will surely lead the Purple Lotus Sect to unprecedented glory!"
In contrast, Ni Lua’s name was mentioned less and less.
He advanced too—but steadily. Quietly.
Without fanfare.
For a brief moment, the Sect Mistress watched her elder son with concern.
Would his Dao heart waver?
Would being overshadowed plant seeds of resentment?
But Ni Lua did not show even the slightest crack.
One evening, he sat alone in a secluded garden.
Chrysanthemum flowers swayed gently around him, their pale petals glowing under the golden hues of sunset.
He sat cross-legged on the cool stone path, eyes closed.
Still.
Calm.
His breathing steady.
His presence grounded like the trunk of a thousand-year-old tree.
There was no envy in him.
No impatience.
His eyes, when they opened, were like two deep ponds—silent, reflective, unfathomable. 𝓯𝓻𝒆𝙚𝒘𝓮𝙗𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝒍.𝙘𝓸𝙢
Wang Chen watched this scene with a satisfied expression.
Indeed.
This was the Ni Lua he knew.
Even stripped of memory.
Even reborn.
His core nature remained unchanged.
The world might praise Rin.
But Ni Lua was sharpening something far more dangerous.
And at that moment, a faint glint flickered in Wang Chen’s eyes.
It is time to take action...
..
Wang Chen sincerely admired Ni Lua’s bravery and Dao Heart.
It wasn’t just empty praise.
Ni Lua had already proven his worth once. Through him, Doom Clock had evolved into something as absurd as Final Hour. Through him, Wang Chen had glimpsed a path of cultivation he himself might not have dared to tread.
Some people were tools.
Some were stepping stones.
Ni Lua was neither.
He was a sharpening stone.
The gears in Wang Chen’s mind began to tick slowly.
This time, Ni Lua needed to serve again.
The Absolute Concealment Formation had saved him countless times. But recently, the gazes that brushed across his existence were no longer ordinary. They were ancient. Vast. Curious in a way that made his spine turn cold.
He could no longer fully trust the formation as it was.
It needed to evolve.
It needed to become something broken.
And to evolve it, he needed comprehension beyond his own.
With that thought, a single wisp of Divine Sense drifted downward from the heavens of the Garden of Eternity.
It descended silently, like mist slipping between leaves, and gradually condensed into the figure of an old Daoist.
White hair cascaded to his shoulders. A beard reached almost to his stomach. His back was slightly hunched, and he leaned on a simple wooden staff. His robes were plain, faded by time.
He looked harmless.
He was anything but.
The moment his feet touched the stone path of the chrysanthemum garden, Ni Lua’s eyes snapped open.
"Who goes there?"
His voice was calm, but his body had already shifted slightly, ready to retreat or strike.
This garden was private. Guarded. No outsider should have been able to enter.
Yet this old man stood there as if he had always belonged.
Wang Chen observed him with genuine amazement.
Ni Lua had barely stepped into cultivation.
Yet he sensed danger instantly.
His instincts were razor sharp.
Wang Chen chuckled softly.
"It seems we really are tied by fate, oh young cultivator..."
His voice was hoarse, aged, yet carried a strange resonance.
"So young, and you have already begun cultivating. It seems you have a great destiny ahead of you..."
Ni Lua did not relax.
His eyes narrowed slightly.
"I do not recall inviting any guests. Elder, how did you enter this place?"
Direct. Unafraid.
Wang Chen’s lips curved upward faintly.
Good.
Very good.
"Fate as it may be," he said lightly, "let me gift you something for meeting me."
Without further explanation, he raised a trembling finger.
A single rune of light condensed at its tip.
It was not bright. Not flashy. But within it was layered understanding—his comprehension of Absolute Concealment, refined, polished, stripped of excess.
The rune drifted forward like a falling leaf.
Ni Lua’s pupils constricted.
His instincts screamed at him to dodge.
But something deeper—something that did not belong to this lifetime—held him still.
The rune touched his forehead.
In an instant, a torrent of knowledge surged into his mind.
Formations.
Veins of qi.
Hidden layers between space and space.
The art of erasing one’s presence not by hiding, but by slipping into the blind spots of reality itself.
Ni Lua staggered back half a step.
His breathing grew uneven.
But he did not cry out.
He did not collapse.
He endured.
From above, Wang Chen watched with narrowed eyes.
With his understanding of Ni Lua, he was certain.
This fellow would master it.
Not just replicate it.
Improve it.
In the garden below, Ni Lua slowly lifted his head.
The confusion in his gaze had not disappeared.
But beneath it, a spark ignited.
A quiet, dangerous spark.
And the old Daoist smiled faintly, his figure already beginning to blur into mist
