Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Cutting through the tentacles that moved towards him in an attempt to stop him from escaping, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself as he watched the path, he had cut through the cap of the mushroom being closed up beneath him at a speed visible to the naked eye-

Swish-!

In the end, he could only gather his strength once again and launch a new attack downwards to widen the hole that had already shrunk to the point where he could no longer fit through. Making sure to make it far larger than before so the mushroom wouldn't be able to recover in time.

Rumble~!

However, as he was only a few dozen meters away from leaving the inside of the mushroom cap, the entire immortal mushroom began trembling before the recovery speed of the hole increased by several times. Almost directly colliding with him if he hadn't used his dao domain to forcibly hold back the living walls all around him, while also making sure that the hole beneath him wasn't closed up either.

RUMBLE-!

Even then, the immortal mushroom only seemed to increase the power, as Xuan Hao clearly sensed the Dao of Life all around him forcibly bearing down on his dao domain from all sides.

Whoosh-!

Luckily, he didn't have to endure this for long, as he soon managed to successfully reach the other side of the mushroom cap. Allowing him to freely plummet towards the ground below without any spores around to attack him…

Not that it would last for long, as the immortal mushroom started producing even more spores shortly after he managed to land on the ground. Not to mention, the spores that had already been produced had already become visible as they washed over the side of the immortal mushroom's cap like a waterfall of spores attempting to block him from escaping from underneath the immortal mushroom-

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

Not just that, but hundreds of massive tendrils shot up from the ground all around the immortal mushroom before similarly attacking him in an attempt to prevent him from escaping.

All things considered, even though he had managed to escape from the spores for now, his situation wasn't that much better and would probably only grow worse if he counted to stay around and try to fight with the immortal mushroom. Especially considering that the strange energy that strengthened the immortal mushroom was still gathering towards it and strengthening during the fight. Meaning that it would only continue growing stronger.

So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to use all of his strength on rushing out from underneath the immortal mushroom before it had time to trap him. Hopefully to somewhere where the space wasn't sealed off and he could use the Drifting Cloud Steps to its full potential.

With the speed of a spatial based movement technique, it would be impossible for the immortal mushroom to catch up with him unless its strength far surpassed his and reached a realm like the Profound Immortal Realm.

Rumble~!

Of course, the immortal mushroom wasn't just going to allow him to escape, as the newly produced spores and tendrils from below all surged towards him like a tide-

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Luckily, as the number of spores hadn't managed to grow large enough and the fact that the tendrils only carried the strength of someone who had barely broken through to the Dao Seed Realm, he managed to forcibly charge forward even under attack of the immortal mushroom.

Soon enough arriving at the area where the spores from the mushroom cap above were trying to cut him off before they had a time to do so. Allowing him to slip past them without any problems while continuing to rush in the opposite direction of the immortal mushroom to try and get out of the range of its space sealing ability.

Whoosh-!

Something that didn't take long, as he soon disappeared with the drifting cloud steps once again showing its terrifying speed.

Rumble-!

Of course, the immortal mushroom didn't give up its chase just because of this, as it forcibly lifted itself off the ground with a countless tendrils forming a writhing mass of tendrils below the stem of the immortal mushroom that carried it in the direction Xuan Hao had escaped in.

Although it would be a truly horrifying and at the same time terrifying sight for anyone unfortunate enough to witness the immortal mushrooms movement, its speed was by no means something to fear, as it was barely comparable to someone in the Dao Seed Realm and would even be overtaken by Soul Ascension Realm cultivators skilled in movement techniques or flying demon beast in the soul Ascension Realm.

Even if it wanted to catch up with Xuan Hao, it was simply far too slow to even catch the hem of his clothes as he almost instantly disappeared out of sight after he regained his ability to use the Dao of Space together with his movement technique.

However, as Xuan Hao decided to slow down to see if the immortal mushroom was even capable of moving, he was shocked to discover that the speed of the immortal mushroom seemed to be steadily increasing as it rolled through the mushroom forest and integrated any mushroom or mushroom monster into the writhing mass of tentacles below it.

"This mushroom can not only increase its strength with time but can even grow its speed in this kind of way!?" Not knowing what to say as he saw the immortal mushroom and how it seemed to be steadily increasing its speed as it rolled through the mushroom forest towards him, Xuan Hao didn't waste any more time as he executed the drifting cloud steps and disappeared once again.

Although it would take a long time before the immortal mushroom would reach a speed where it could threaten him, he now knew that it would be possible. Not to mention, it didn't need to catch him, but only needed to trap him with the space sealing ability that would undoubtedly grow to cover a larger area as its strength continued to increase.

For now, he needed to figure out the challenge of the celestial trial and complete it as fast as possible!

Whoosh~

With that in mind, Xuan Hao took out the four stone slabs after landing on a mushroom far away from the immortal mushroom chasing after him, causing the four stone slabs to fly out of his hands and merge together with a bright light. Forming a familiar looking scroll in front of him.

"Finally, I should be able to find out what I need to do to leave this place!" Narrowing both of his eyes as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao grabbed the scroll of trials. Wasting no time as he looked over the words on top of the scroll.

[Scroll of Trials, Trail of the Immortal Mushrooms]

A title that made it clear that the mushrooms he had encountered were related to the challenge in some way. However, as he continued reading through the scroll of trials, Xuan Hao could no help silently cursing to himself.

The goal of the celestial trial was not related to the immortal mushrooms like Xuan Hao had thought after reading the first few words on the scroll but was instead just about going through a gate that was located directly beneath the mushroom that one ended up on after entering the trial.

According to the scroll of trials, this information would be given to the trail participants before entering the trial by one of the people in charge of the celestial trial.

As for the existence of the scroll of trails and the stone slabs, they served the purpose of allowing trail participants to adjust the difficulty of the trial.

The more stone slabs collected, the more difficult the trial would be, while collecting the scroll of trial could be considered the highest difficulty and would therefore give out the biggest reward for completing the celestial trial.

At the same time, he also managed to learn that the other immortal mushroom should not be moving towards him, but instead the location of the gate leading out of the celestial trial the moment he collected the final stone slab.

"I hate this trial…" Knowing that he couldn't waste any time or he would risk having to deal with the immortal mushrooms guarding the way out of the celestial trial, Xuan Hao could only mutter this to himself before he once again used the drifting cloud steps to rush back in the direction of the mushroom he had ended up on top of when he had first passed through the celestial gate and entered the trial.

Unfortunately, considering the distance between him and that place having widened quite a bit, he would need at least 10 hours to reach it, 8 if he used all of his strength. More than enough time for the closest immortal mushroom to reach the gate…