Chapter 316: 【grotto-heaven Blessed Land】
Inside the Shadow Space, the Tiger Demon perceived all kinds of information and knowledge brought by the Door. It quickly realized why it had two doors: it was entirely due to the Shadow Dream Hole.
When he initially opened the Shadow Dream Hole in Insect City, he had completed the first Door opening in his life.
However, that door was not entirely created by strength, so it naturally did not fully belong to him; the World Will held more control. At that time, the Shadow Dream Hole came with a Shadow Space, serving as the interlayer between the Bubble World and Nightmare Dimension.
Now, the Worm Pillar had saved the structural information of the Shadow Dream Hole and projected it onto the Deed.
Therefore, during the process of opening the Mountain Lord’s Domain, it directly stimulated the Deed to simulate the birth process of a Grotto-Heaven Blessed Land, collapsing and contracting the core hub of Yin Mountain, and packing it into this space model.
It conveniently opened a built-in Grotto-Heaven Space for the Mountain Lord’s Domain. The back door was the original channel connecting the Shadow Dream Hole to the Nightmare Layer; now it connects the Grotto-Heaven Space to the world behind the Door.
Snake Snake: “For you, there is actually only one Door. Turn the scale to 1, and it’s the world behind the door. Turn it to -1, and it’s the Grotto-Heaven Space. But for the Grotto-Heaven, it is sandwiched between the Present World and different time-space, so it naturally needs two doors.”
“Got it!”
The Tiger Demon nodded, then slowly strolled to the round hatch symbolizing the back door, raised its tiger claw, and touched the scale 1 on the handle.
Then, it sensed a faint threatening feeling transmitted from outside the door. So, without changing expression, it decisively withdrew its claw. It did not foolishly open the door to explore the truth behind the Door.
Logically speaking, if he chose to open the back door at this moment, Yuan Zhu had 99.9% certainty that the Shadow Door would lead to Du Ling’s Shadow Layer (Shadow Dimension) in the present world. The remaining 0.1% possibility was the Spirit Layer.
As for that faint threatening premonition, it came not only from spiritual sense but also from the Door’s intelligent judgment!
As a Door that could back up saves for itself and provide one resurrection opportunity, having some intelligence to predict danger was very reasonable. Just like a smart door lock that can observe and analyze strangers outside the door.
Snake Snake: “Boss, aren’t you curious? Don’t you want to open the door and go out for a stroll?”
The Tiger Demon shook its head: “Not prepared yet. This Door appeared too unexpectedly, it’s a sudden event beyond my expectations. So before making full preparations, I don’t plan to rashly enter the world behind the Door. This sense of danger… there is real danger!”
While it was speaking, Yuan Zhu suddenly noticed that the Shadow Space (Grotto-Heaven) he was in, or rather this back door, was currently suffering invisible attacks.
If the Shadow Space had a health bar, it was losing blood at an extremely slow speed. His premonition was not wrong; the unknown world outside the Door was attacking the Shadow Space, and the back door was suffering erosion damage.
This attack might not be active in nature; it was very likely that the environment of the world outside the door was too harsh. It spontaneously triggered passive damage, making his Door constantly under attack at all times.
To slowly drain blood from a newly born Grotto-Heaven was enough to show that the world outside the door was somewhat dangerous. His decision not to open the door was correct.
Fortunately, the Shadow Grotto-Heaven relied on the Yin Mountain Dharma Domain to exist and could draw Shadow Spiritual Energy from the range covered by the Domain to repair these damages.
Therefore, although the health bar was dropping on one side, it was also recovering blood on the other, pulling back and forth.
After strolling around inside the Shadow Grotto-Heaven, the Tiger Demon did not plan to stay here much longer. So it came to the front door position, raised its claw to turn the lock dial from -1 to 0, pointing to the real world, and mentally issued the ‘open door’ command.
As the Shadow Door opened outward from the inside, it simultaneously left behind a circular illusory shadow, like an invisible membrane, separating the Grotto-Heaven inside the door from the external reality, preventing the polluted spiritual machine inside the space from leaking out.
The Tiger Demon leaped out from the space inside the door. Immediately after, it sensed something was wrong.
At this time, inside the Mountain Lord’s Cave Dwelling, it was empty. Not only had the eight Worm Pillars that originally supported the Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams Formation disappeared; the cultivation resources piled up in the corners had also completely vanished from the Cave Dwelling, all transferred to the Shadow Grotto-Heaven.
Not only that, the original Cave Dwelling was the core hub of the Yin Mountain Dharma Domain, with the floor underfoot, surrounding stone walls, and ceiling interior all covered in vein networks connected to the Heavenly Dipper and Earthly Fiends Formation, transmitting Shadow Spiritual Energy with extremely high energy intensity.
But now, all that abundant Spiritual Essence had completely disappeared. It was as if a super genius full of knowledge and lore suddenly had its brain drained and injured its prodigy. Turning into a mediocre person who could only read and recognize characters but had no literary talent, unable to even write a high school excellent essay.
The original Domain hub had not disappeared but had been transferred. Packed into the Door Space, sinking into a dimension deeper than reality, yet still deeply bound to Yin Mountain, maintaining the Domain’s Spiritual Energy operation, even more efficiently.
The Cave Dwelling after being hollowed out was like an empty shell drained of essence and soul. The concentration of Shadow Spiritual Energy (pollution) inside the Cave Dwelling depended on the average value of Yin Mountain.
Compared to the outside world, the cave was still considered rich in Spiritual Energy. But compared to the Grotto-Heaven inside the Door, it was utterly ordinary.
Yuan Zhu: “Interesting! This is the same as the Grotto-Heaven introduced by the Old Temple Priest. But compared to Yellow Heaven Blessed Land, my Door Space is more like Kunlun Grotto-Heaven. Relying on the present world to exist, without devouring everything of the Yin Mountain Dharma Domain to open an independent Grotto-Heaven World and then ascend and flee.”
Yuan Zhu stood inside the Cave Dwelling reduced to an empty shell, closed his eyes to perceive his Door World.
The Grotto-Heaven Space was actually not large, only slightly expanded from the Cave Dwelling, about the size of a mansion, even smaller than his Haunted House.
The Grotto-Heaven World relied on Yin Mountain to exist, yet half-step detached from real time-space, but firmly bound by the Mountain Lord’s Domain, integrated with the Domain as one body.
In Yuan Zhu’s view, this was a manifestation of Ascension.
The Shadow Space (Grotto-Heaven) had condensed too much high-energy pollution essence, not just an issue of massive Shadow Power. It also included the core hub of the Mountain Lord’s Domain, the Deed, and advanced products like the Landlord God Position.
Even a mere transcendent, when the pollution degree in the body was too high, would trigger Ascension Impulse and be rejected by the real world into the Spirit Layer.
Yuan Zhu’s Tiger Demon Stance, once leaving the Haunted House and unfolding in reality, would feel the ground sinking underfoot, with the illusion of sinking into Shadow at any time and unable to extricate itself.
Now, the vast Yin Mountain Dharma Domain’s pollution core (Grotto-Heaven Space) formed by high-energy collapse and condensation would naturally suffer rejection from the present world, forced to half-step ascend and sink into the Shadow Dimension.
And locked dead by the entire Shadow Domain, unable to fully fall into the Shadow Layer, stuck in the crevice between reality and shadow.
…
Yuan Zhu toured around the Cave Dwelling and found that it was no longer the core hub of Yin Mountain, no different from other areas of Yin Mountain.
The newly born core Grotto-Heaven Space was now omnipresent, capable of quantum overlap with any position in the Yin Mountain Dharma Domain.
Outside the high-dimensional core of the Grotto-Heaven, the Domain coverage area had violently expanded by a circle, encompassing most of the Cold Pond and the two neighboring half-mountains.
The maximum radiation range outside the Domain was calculated with the Domain area at a 10:1 ratio.
In other words, assuming the Mountain Lord’s Domain had a diameter of 1km, the Mountain Lord could, within the absolute control range, freely control clouds and rain, regulate the ecosystem, and perform simulated management.
Then, the surrounding 10km outside the Domain belonged to the Mountain Lord’s sphere of influence, its territory. Everything within this range was influenced by its natural ecosystem (but not controlled).
The outer layers gradually had nothing to do with the Mountain Lord.
According to the information fed back from the Mountain Lord’s Domain, the Tiger Demon only needed to continuously drive new Insect Pillar Town Stones into the periphery of the Heavenly Dipper and Earthly Fiends Formation, gradually expanding the absolute control area; it could leverage a larger radiation range at a 1:10 ratio.
The broader the Mountain Lord’s radiation range, the more Shadow Spiritual Energy the Domain draws, then pours back to nourish the Shadow Grotto-Heaven, elevating the Mountain Lord’s status, achieving a positive cycle.
Snake Snake: “Boss, good news! Based on our current Mountain Lord’s Domain area, the Mountain Lord’s sphere of influence at least exceeds a radius of a hundred li! By straight-line distance, the Frog Factory can also be included in the future!”
Yuan Zhu’s Domain was initially formed, whether the Grotto-Heaven Space, Mountain Lord’s Domain, or maximum radiation range, all needed a period of grind and adaptation like the previous Heavenly Dipper Formation.
After everything stabilized, the Domain also needed to continuously charge and accumulate energy to gradually expand the radiation range, ultimately covering the distant Frog Factory beyond the Misty Mountains.
If during this expansion process, it encountered or touched other Landlord’s territories, or the pollution depression previously occupied by White Deer, then blind spots would appear in the Mountain Lord’s sphere of influence. Even enclaves within the country, leading to territory domination wars.
After taking stock of the changes in the Mountain Lord’s Domain, Yuan Zhu was satisfied with this.
Next, he noticed that the content of his Deed had expanded greatly. Not only did he gain full ownership of Yin Mountain, but he also additionally condensed three sub-ledgers under his control and command.
Corresponding respectively to: Cold Pond, Cold Cicada Peak, Xian Zhi Mountain.
He, as this Mountain Lord, could not only appoint Yin Mountain sub-goat. He could also recruit one lake god and two minor mountain gods, forming a small court. This set of team system was not built-in to the Deed, but a template from the Tiger Demon Inheritance.
Tiger Demon Inheritance focused on carving up the Yin-Yang Realms, privately setting up City God, establishing a local small team.
If not for this, the native Deed would only continuously devour and accommodate more land and mountains, blindly expanding the land area corresponding to the Deed, and would not differentiate sub-ledgers to appoint vassals.
Yuan Zhu sighed: “My Shadow System indeed fits the Yellow Heaven Method, with two words engraved in its bones: civil service exam!”
The Yellow Heaven Method, while creating the world, built the Immortal Class System. His Mountain Lord’s Domain was also pursuing this, just with lower aspirations, pursuing the City God System.
…
Snake Snake asked at this time: “Boss, what do we do now? Shall we plan the Domain’s construction plan? For example, copy the Animal Husbandry Village structure?”
Yuan Zhu shook his head, rejecting her suggestion: “The external environment is different, no comparability!”
However, Snake Snake’s reminder made him think of appropriately simulating some characteristic environments of the Shadow Domain (animal husbandry) within the Domain range.
So he said: “Those Reverse Growth Mulberry Seedlings can be transplanted to the Spiritual Energy nodes of the Mountain Lord’s Domain. Root in the Shadow Spirit Vein, absorb nutrients (pollution), release Spiritual Energy, and improve the valley air.”
Not mentioning the Grotto-Heaven Space that had sunk into the different dimension, just the Heavenly Dipper and Earthly Fiends Formation remaining in the real world could be seen as a closed barrier space. Perfect for transplanting Reverse Growth Mulberry Trees, producing pollution miasma, and creating an underground world environment.
With this miasma environment, spirit insect eggs could be further hatched, various magic worms raised, fed with feed and food, then batch-develop corpse seeds, harvest spirit grass and medicine, entering a virtuous cycle.
Snake Snake received the order and responded positively: “I’ll arrange for the eggplant goblins to plant trees right away! Good news: originally, the eggplant goblins’ activity range was limited and could not detach from the maximum length of the Shadow Eggplant Vine. But now with the Domain formed, they can wirelessly connect via their own eggplant seedlings, draw Shadow Spiritual Energy in the WiFi range to nourish their internal seedlings, achieving free movement effect.”
Yuan Zhu: “Good news!”
Without the ‘tail length’ restriction on their butts, the eggplant goblins’ movement range was larger and more flexible. Representing they could do more work, greatly improving efficiency.
Handing the tree-planting task to Snake Snake, Yuan Zhu in the Cave Dwelling raised his hand again and discovered a major feature of the Door: it always followed his own movement. No matter where he was, he could summon the Door.
But the Grotto-Heaven Space behind the Door must be within the WiFi signal range of the Domain to open.
The Door relied on the Tiger Demon to exist, but the Grotto-Heaven Space did not rely on the Tiger Demon; it was a Grotto-Heaven Blessed Land nurtured by the Mountain Lord’s Domain, overlapping with Yin Mountain.
Only by perceiving the existence of the Mountain Lord’s Domain could the entrance to the Grotto-Heaven be opened.
Yuan Zhu was now inside the Domain, so with a thought, he teleported all the Reverse Growth Mulberry Seedlings from the Grotto-Heaven Space out. The consumption was negligible.
In the spirit world, Snake Snake unfolded the Mountain Lord’s Domain blueprint, quickly selected several Spiritual Energy nodes where vein root tendrils intersected, then issued task instructions to the eggplant goblins, letting them proactively go to the Mountain Lord’s Cave Dwelling to transport seedlings, then plant trees at designated locations.
After assigning tasks, Yuan Zhu did not leave the Cave Dwelling and go down the steps. Instead, he summoned the Door in front of him; this time he did not turn the scale, just stepped into the Door.
The next second, the Door opened out of thin air by the Cold Pond at the foot of the mountain, and Yuan Zhu’s foot happened to step out, landing on the ground, attracting the attention of White Deer who was bathing.
“Yoh?!”
After completing the space teleportation, Yuan Zhu nodded to White Deer, then evaluated: “Feels good!”
Other ability users, when condensing the Door, only got a space door leading to other dimensions (Spirit Layer). Using it consumed huge amounts, and it was not something that could be casually opened just because they wanted to.
When ability users were weak, opening the Door required paying a huge price (fee) to enter dangerous different time-space for cultivation. When ability users rapidly got stronger, opening the Door no longer required fees. On the contrary, they would even be rejected and driven into the Door afterward due to being too strong (pollution concentration too high).
By then, opening the Door was no longer a problem; instead, wanting to return to reality through the Door required a huge price, and they could not stay in the present world too long before being rejected again into the world behind the Door.
Yuan Zhu’s Door not only retained basic functions but was also closely related to the Deed and the Mountain Lord’s Domain represented by the Deed.
He could use the Door to achieve nearly zero-fee free teleportation within the absolute control range of the Domain, and opening the door from the Grotto-Heaven to transport supplies also had extremely low consumption.
But outside the Domain range, space movement could not be completed; and the price to open the Grotto-Heaven Space gradually increased.
Once detached from the Mountain Lord’s radiation range, opening the Grotto-Heaven Space again would be extremely difficult. The worse the signal and the farther the distance, the higher the difficulty of opening the door.
At this time, the whitened White Deer approached again, trying to please Yuan Zhu, lightly rubbing his body with its horn: “Yoh yoh!”
Yuan Zhu looked at the freshly produced sub-ledger, smiled and rubbed the deer’s head: “Good dog! This seat will grant you a fortune today!”
Originally planning to cultivate it into a sub-goat, but perhaps it was fate? So he used Anti-Law to stuff the incomplete Deed of Xian Zhi Mountain into its soul, completing the binding of a secondary mountain god!
