After my grandmother called me home in my dream, my spiritual energy revived

Chapter 270 Late Stage of the Spiritual Qi Tide
The departure of the cats made Song Miaozhu feel even more pressed for time.

The cultivators of their time could not live for hundreds or thousands of years like those in ancient cultivation books, their cultivation levels increasing with each advancement. They could only try to reach the pinnacle of cultivation as quickly as possible.

There is no calendar in the mountains, and one is unaware of the changing seasons and the passing years.

The moment Song Miaozhu broke through to the Black Spirit Rank, the global surge of spiritual energy it triggered lasted for three whole years. As the source of the surge, Xiaozhushan experienced an even more astonishing ten-year-long surge of spiritual energy.

During this golden age, the concentration of spiritual energy between heaven and earth reached an unprecedented level, almost inexhaustible.

Abundant spiritual energy flows freely between heaven and earth, and even ancient artifacts buried deep underground are transformed into precious, ownerless spiritual objects under the nourishment of this abundant spiritual energy.

The cultivators seized this rare opportunity, frequently venturing deep underground to collect wandering spiritual resources.

However, as time went on, the duration of subsequent energy surges gradually shortened, while the calm periods between the two surges became longer and longer.

After the last wisp of spiritual energy from Xiaozhushan ceased to flow, there had been no new spiritual energy surges worldwide for a full year.

Faced with this situation, most cultivators did not show excessive worry, because the air was still filled with the spiritual energy left over from the previous surge. This spiritual energy, which had not yet been fully absorbed, could temporarily meet the needs of cultivation. They only thought that before long, a longer surge would come again, just like before.

Only Song Miaozhu keenly realized that this grand feast of spiritual energy, which had lasted for many years, was coming to an end, and the tide of spiritual energy had irreversibly entered its later stages and begun to decline.

At this moment, the black spirit crystal symbolizing her Black Spirit Rank cultivation level within her spiritual space had only just condensed to the ninth layer.

Song Miaozhu did not choose to remind the Spirit Regulation Bureau about the changes in the spiritual energy tides.

Back then, she had already made all the ancient cultivation books available for them to copy, so the Spirit Regulation Bureau was naturally aware of the pattern of phased changes in spiritual energy tides.

The only thing they were unsure about was when she would break through, and whether the previous global surge of spiritual energy was a natural phenomenon or an anomaly caused by her advancement.

Song Miaozhu has always been accustomed to delaying the disclosure of her true cultivation level. Since stepping into the White Spirit Realm, she has noticed the declining trend of spiritual energy tides and has never revealed her specific realm to the outside world.

Because she hoped that other cultivators would realize later, much later, that the spiritual energy tide had entered its later stages—the later the better!
The radiance of Xiaozhushan was so dazzling that even a paper mist curtain could not completely conceal it.

If the outside world knew that the spiritual energy tide had entered its later stages and that there would be no more naturally gushing spiritual energy, would those cultivators who were used to rapid advancement in their cultivation and being surrounded by various spiritual objects really be willing to return to the past era without spiritual energy and spiritual objects? If they were unwilling, what crazy things would they do?
If anyone harbors greed, the radiant Xiaozhushan will inevitably become the target of everyone's ire.

Song Miaozhu never underestimated the greed of human nature—the underworld is always bustling with activity!

In order to make Xiaozhushan less conspicuous, after the last surge of spiritual energy, Song Miaozhu began to actively absorb the free spiritual energy in the mountain for cultivation.

Most of the spiritual energy accumulated over the years has turned into spiritual water that seeps into the ground and condenses into spiritual stone veins. Only a small amount of gaseous spiritual energy remains, circulating within the Xiaozhushan area under the operation of the Nine-Turn Paper Spirit Cage.

The remaining spiritual energy, if placed outside, would be enough to support the cultivators of a town for several years, but for Song Miaozhu, it only allowed her to barely cultivate to the ninth level of the Black Spirit Realm. Before she could even attempt a breakthrough, the spiritual energy of Xiaozhu Mountain was completely exhausted, and not a single trace could be extracted.

Left with no other choice, Song Miaozhu could only use her stored top-grade spirit stones to nourish cultural relics and collect spiritual essences, while researching new paper-crafting techniques and methods of spirit infusion in order to break through the bottleneck.

Fortunately, Yan Feng was a shrewd businessman, earning huge sums of money every day, and the top-quality spirit stones she exchanged were enough to support her research expenses.

However, in nurturing spirit creatures, she could no longer feed each one with spiritual energy every day as she had in the past; she could only reduce the supply to just enough to sustain their basic activities.

After all, she wasn't sure if she could cultivate to the point where she could touch the Seven-Colored Light Gate with just the spirit stones she had on hand.

Fortunately, her spirit creatures were already far beyond the level of ordinary cultivators, so even if the cultivation process was slowed down, the impact would not be significant.

However, Song Miaozhu was still generous to the spiritual paper puppets such as Zhangli, Yuelin, Guanhong, Yiheng, and Yanfeng, allowing them to absorb spiritual power to their heart's content—after all, their role had long surpassed that of other spiritual objects.

Even Song Miaozhu has started to use spirit stones frugally, so the situation for other cultivators will only become more difficult.

"Miss, I suggest we suspend the sale of spirit souls for now and save them up until you advance in rank," Yan Feng said solemnly to her.

“Last time, Zhao Huoyan subtly asked me if the spiritual energy of Xiaozhushan was still surging. They should already be suspecting that the spiritual energy tide has entered its later stage.”

He paused, then continued, "In addition, the little paper servants working in the spirit investigation teams in various places have reported that they haven't been able to retrieve any artifacts for the spirit investigation bureau for a whole month."

Within the Bureau of Spiritual Investigation, some have even suggested ceasing the rental of ghost shops' warehouses to store cultural relics—after all, without the nourishment of spiritual energy, those relics will no longer transform into spiritual objects.

“Recently, the global concentration of spiritual energy has dropped to its lowest level in history, almost the same as when spiritual energy first began to recover.”

Yan Feng's tone grew increasingly somber: "The online posts about the 'Dharma-ending Age' are becoming more and more popular. The spiritual energy remaining in the air is not even enough for cultivators' daily practice. Many cultivators' spiritual power is not even enough to drive spiritual objects, let alone use the excess spiritual energy to cultivate unclaimed spiritual objects or collect spiritual souls."

After listening, Song Miaozhu nodded slightly: "Let's not sell for now! Let's shift the focus of our business to the underworld and earn ghost money!"

She knew very well that once spiritual energy was depleted, the market for spiritual objects and spirits would inevitably shrink drastically.

Continuing to sell these items will not only make it difficult to close deals, but will also arouse suspicion—why can she still sell spiritual items and spirits continuously when others struggle to even continue their cultivation?

Neither of these can exist without spiritual energy.

Xiaozhushan's defenses are indeed formidable. Whether it's the bamboo horse boundary marker, the mind-controlling paper grass, or the sky-patrolling paper crane, they are all enough to deter any cultivator who dares to venture into the mountain.

But Song Miaozhu knew in her heart that no matter how strong these guardian spirits were, they could not stop cultivators from all over the world.