<h4>Chapter 240: Shauna Valley</h4>


    Trantor: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio


    There were many uses for the Imprisonment Restriction. By using it, Yang Ling could create an alternate space within crystal ores, limit the activity of his enemies, or even render his opponent motionless. He could use it to control an individual enemy or manipte an entire group by using the restriction on arger scale.


    Using the Imprisonment Restriction, Yang Ling split his mental energy and Wizard Power into tiny strands and used them to control the crystal balls within the Heart of the Ocean. After injecting his Blood Essence into the crystal balls, tiny mysterious symbols appeared on the surface of every ball, slowly revolving around the orbs.


    After absorbing a massive amount of Yang Ling’s mental energy and Wizard Power, the Heart of the Ocean slowly grew brighter and brighter, releasing a ring of incandescent light.


    Buzz...


    After letting out a crisp ring, the Heart of the Ocean started to shudder, levitating in the air and slowly rotating around itself. It absorbed the spiritual energy and life force from the surroundings as if it was a Spirit Gathering Spell Formation, quickly creating an rming energy vortex. The thinting of the spider’s web was instantly torn to pieces. At the same time, the crystal balls within the Heart of the Ocean suddenly rotated at a much higher speed, forming a strange picture as thousands of the orbs bunched together.


    The images were ever-changing and transformed at an extremely fast rate. They would sometimes show a sky of white clouds, sometimes an azure ocean, sometimes a lush forest...


    Every time the image changed, Yang Ling could sense that the Heart of the Ocean was absorbing the energy from the outside world at an increasingly high rate. Each of the crystal balls seemed to be absorbing arge amount of energy like a sponge, then spinning faster and faster. The corresponding speed at which the images changed also became faster!


    Slowly, after absorbing arge amount of Yang Ling’s Wizard Power, mental energy, and Blood Essence, each of the crystal balls released a weak ripple of energy, which became clearer and clearer under the effects of the Imprisonment Restriction. To Yang Ling, it felt as though he was turning on a surround sound system, or that he had encountered arge group of naughty imps.


    “Could it be that the Heart of the Ocean was using these crystal balls to form maps in order to disy the surrounding terrain in real-time?” After sensing the change in the tiny crystal balls, Yang Ling had a thought. He once again increased the intensity of the Wizard Power and mental energy he was releasing, infusing them into the tiny crystal balls through the Imprisonment Restriction. He seemed to havee into contact with the core secret of the Heart of the Ocean.


    Buzz...


    After letting out a shrill sound, the Heart of the Ocean, which had been rotating continuously at a high speed, began to gradually slow down. It released bolts of light, alternating between red, green, and blue. After the orb stopped rotating, the color on the surface of the Heart of the Ocean stopped changing, once again taking on its gray, murky appearance. But unlike before, it now released an obscure ripple of energy from within.


    “Did my tests fail once again?” Yang Ling shook his head as he looked at the Heart of the Ocean levitating eerily in the air. He had expected to learn all the secrets of the Heart of the Ocean after spending such arge amount of energy and time on it. However, just as he was about to stand up and return the Heart of the Ocean to his Space Ring for safekeeping so that he could continue on his journey, a surprising scene suddenly yed out!


    Yang Ling was about to extend his hand towards it when the Heart of the Ocean, still floating in the air, automatically traveled toward his palm, its speed as fast as lightning!


    “Oh, could it be that I can directly control it using my mental energy?” Doubtful, Yang Ling came up with an idea, carefully recalling the ces he had passed on his way here.


    Slowly, the surface of the Heart of the Ocean released a streak of bright light, expanding in both directions like a wave as it formed a series of images. Soon, it disyed the ces Yang Ling had passed by earlier in a globe-like fashion, from Wissen Town to the littleke. The image was clear and realistic. Yang Ling could even see the fish swimming within theke waters.


    “An aerial camera or a GPS receiver?”


    Yang Ling was ted when he saw the Heart of the Ocean disy a map in real-time, then became ovee with emotion. Even the Americans, the frontrunners of GPS technology, could only set the uracy of the images sent by satellites to within one meter. There was no way that they would be able to capture the small fish darting around in theke. To think that the Heart of the Ocean in his hand could aplish such a feat! It lived up to its reputation as the treasure of the Seattu Tribe!


    With the Heart of the Ocean in hand, Yang Ling left the littleke quickly, darting around in the lush primordial forest. The Heart of the Ocean recorded the details of the terrain of every ce he passed, from the towering trees to the foraging ants. It also disyed where he was on the map at any given moment.


    Other than disying the surrounding terrain in real-time, the Heart of the Ocean had many other useful features. It could disy a fully rendered map or just a specific portion of the terrain. It could erge a small area, orpress the entire map. It was incredible.


    However, even though Yang Ling had gained a preliminary understanding of how to use the Heart of the Ocean, he still felt as though he had not gained ess to all of the secrets of this treasure. After all, he still did not know what the massive number of crystal balls within the Heart of the Ocean were made of, or anything about the rhythm in which they moved.


    It looked like there were many more wonders in this world than he had imagined!


    After testing the various applications of the Heart of the Ocean, Yang Ling was once again ovee with emotion when he saw the realistic map of the terrain. He decided that he was going to take the time to closely examine the treasure when he returned to the Wissen Castle. He had a faint intuition that the Heart of the Ocean still held many secrets. It seemed to be much more than a simple globe.


    With the real-time renderings of the Heart of the Ocean and with Elder Klive’s general coordinates, his task became much simpler. He did not have to chart out the map as he moved around the forest and could elerate and move along much faster! In order to finish his mission as soon as possible, Yang Ling headed north, prepared to first scout the terrain near the Shauna Valley.


    The Shauna Valley was about a thousand miles away from the Spider Valley and was unlike any other ce in the Terras Forest. The area was covered by low-lying, fiery-red shrubs, and was easily recognizable. Traveling on the speedy unicorn, Yang Ling sessfully arrived at his destination the very next day.


    It was rumored that in the past, no one had known that such a valley existed within the Terras Forest. However, a thousand years ago, Master Shauna, who was famous for creating Magical Spaces, brought a team of followers into the Terras Forest to gather ingredients for alchemy. He had wandered the area during the nights when he could not sleep, identally stumbling into valley. Other than the plea for help he sent through a Magical Communication Device, there had not been any news of him since.


    Master Shauna was born into a family of earls in the Dr Empire, and his only sister had been the empress of the Dr Empire back then. They owned a piece ofnd spanning thousands of miles near the Forest of Fog, their familyrgely influential. Along with the dozen disciples he had by his side, he also brought a bunch of elite followers with him, and amongst them, there was no shortage of Sword Saints and Magical Tutors.


    After they received Shauna’s plea for help, the leader of the guards immediately led a team of elites to the ce of the incident. Unexpectedly, they suffered from the same mysterious fate as Master Shauna, never to be heard of ever again.


    In their rm, the followers that had set up camp near the area quickly contacted all of the factions they could and asked them to send over strong reinforcements. Amongst them was a team of elite warriors that were sent into the forest by the Church for training.


    In just a day, a substantial number of powerful warriors and exceptional Spellcasters had gathered outside the valley. Together they formed an exploration squad and carefully entered the strange valley under the direction of a red-robed Cardinal from the Church.


    The red-robed Cardinal with abilities deep beyondprehension, powerful warriors, intelligent spellcasters, coupled with highly experienced adventurers... Even though they had been cautious, the group of explorers had also been full of confidence. Unexpectedly, not one of the two hundred people that went into the valley made it out alive!


    The continent slipped into an unprecedented uproar when news of the incident spread. From then on, the people hadbeled this terrifying valley as a forbiddennd. They named the valley Shauna Valley in Master Shauna’s name.


    Having been unable to find the relics of the giant dragon despite all the months of searching, the Dark Association had no choice but to shift their attention to the few perilousnds they knew of, and amongst those was the notorious Shauna Valley. After a few of their scouting teams were killed in the valley, the Dark Association had no choice but to halt their operations.


    Originally, Elder Klive had been prepared to personally explore the Shauna Valley, but he naturally could not pass up on the opportunity to utilize Yang Ling’s abilities. One hundred Alchemists was not a cheap price, but this cost was not worth mentioning whenpared to the Divine Weapons they would find sealed within the relic of the Holy Dragon!


    Yang Ling was not in a hurry to enter the Shauna Valley when he arrived at the destination. Instead, he first rode around the valley on his unicorn and recorded the surroundings outside using the Heart of the Ocean. He examined everything closely, from the fiery-red, low-lying shrubs to the bugs digging in and out of the ground like earthworms. He did not overlook any suspicious spots.


    “Oh, there’s indeed something strange here!” Yang Ling quickly noticed something amiss after roaming the exterior of the valley for about an hour.


    The amount of spirit energy in the air was thin, and it grew thinner the closer he got to the Shauna Valley. Furthermore, he found it hard to absorb green life force even if he ced all his effort into casting the Psychic Spell. Both the low-lying shrubs and small des of grass between them remained motionless, none of them releasing any life force.


    “Is the spiritual energy in the surroundings naturally thin, or is it caused by something devouring it?”


    The other areas within the Terras Forest were filled with spiritual energy, and it seemed impossible that only this valley was an exception. The only exnation for this was that there was something strange, like a ferocious Magical Beast, in the area, devouring the spiritual energy of the surroundings over a long period of time.


    Furthermore, Yang Ling could always sense the familiar ripples released by the nts using his Tree Eyes ability if he was somewhere else, but all he could feel here was bloodthirsty violent energy getting stronger as he approached the Shauna Valley. Both the low-lying shrubs and the fiery-red, three-leafed grasses were all releasing a suppressed, obscure ripple!


    After making his way around the valley for a while longer, Yang Ling had a nagging feeling that something was not right, instinctively sensing a threat. The pagoda-shaped brand on his forehead throbbed as if it was altering him to an unprecedented danger.