Closing his eyes for the second time, Shun Long then spread his soul sense around his surroundings before he mumbled in a low, almost inaudible voice
''Let's try this!''
Spatial fluctuations started to ripple out around his body as soon as the words left his mouth, before he suddenly vanished from the spot he was standing on barely a moment later, almost as if his figure had faded into nothingness.
A full minute later, Shun Long's body reappeared back inside the foggy space in the 'Stone of Time', in the same spot that he was standing on before he disappeared.
It was too bad that Little Black was still asleep, otherwise his reaction would have definitely been extremely interesting to look at, after seeing this scene in front of him.
After all, Shun Long hadn't left the foggy space in the 'Stone of Time' just now, but he had really disappeared.
As soon as he reappeared on the same spot as before, a bright smile appeared on Shun Long's face as he mumbled to himself thoughtfully
''Hmm, space has so many different uses, that its uniqueness is almost at the same level as my Dao of Time.
Since I can completely conceal myself with this technique... I will name this, 'One with the world'!''
As he came to this decision, Shun Long decided to spend the next couple of hours testing this new technique that he had comprehended after breaking through to the early fifth stage of his 'Monarch's Eternal body'.
Indeed, after his breakthrough and since his affinity with the element of space had increased even further, he could now clearly feel the space around him even better than before, allowing him to hide his body inside it.
Of course, although it looked like he had actually vanished and even one's soul sense would be hard-pressed to spot him while he used this technique, Shun Long knew that his 'One with the world' wasn't perfect since he couldn't move while he activated this technique.
He could only stay still and observe his surroundings, but as long as he tried to move around, the technique would instantly break.
And yet, despite this limitation, Shun Long was extremely happy with this technique.
The only thing that he didn't have, was such a protective technique to conceal himself.
Although he wasn't certain if he would be able to hide successfully in front of powerful Dao Kings, Shun Long's intuition told him that there was a high chance for him to succeed.
A few hours later, after consuming 5 stalks of 'Dragonblood grass' to replenish his energy, he closed his eyes and imagined himself leaving the 'Stone of Time', returning back to his room at the inn.
Thankfully, his breakthrough had only lasted for a little more than a week inside the foggy space, meaning that barely 1 day had passed in the outside world.
Although he knew that he still had more than half a day left, Shun Long decided to leave the inn before that and take a quick look at the rest of the Holy city, as well as go and meet with the merchant Ying Gui after that.
After all, according to the second mission that he had accepted from the Assignment Hall, there was less than a day left until Ying Gui's caravan left for Yanzhu city.
Shun Long spent the next 4 hours touring through the shops of the Holy city, especially pill shops in hopes that he could find some rare medicinal herbs.
However, Shun Long didn't know whether it was because he simply was unlucky or if the pill shops that he visited just happened to be like that, but most of them didn't sell almost any rank 6 medicinal herbs, but only sold their pills directly.
Of course, Shun Long wanted to take a look at the rest of the Holy city as well and see if the other pill shops really worked like that, but he knew that it was time to meet with Ying Gui as well.
After remembering the details of the mission, he decided that he would take a look at the rest of the shops in the Holy city after completing his 2 missions, so without any hesitation, he then started walking towards the east of the Holy city.
As he walked towards the east of the city looking for the inn that he was supposed to meet Ying Gui, Shun Long thought back to the things that he had seen in the Holy city in the last 4 hours and realized that he was truly much poorer than he thought.
Although his current wealth could most likely rival that of an average early-stage Dao King from the central region, this was as far as it could go.
Shun Long simply couldn't compare yet to even middle-stage Dao Kings, let alone the truly rich heirs and families that lived in the Holy city.
He had already seen that an average early rank 6 magic beast actually costed anywhere from 1 to 1.5 million middle-grade spirit stones!
This meant that as long as an average middle-stage Dao King was strong enough and he managed to capture a living early rank 6 magic beast, he could actually make as many spirit stones as an average early stage Dao King had managed to gather throughout his life.
Of course, this was the price for a living early rank 6 magic beast and not a dead one, otherwise the price would drop by many times. Capturing a rank 6 magic beast alive was also much tougher than one would think, as most magic beasts were almost impossible to be subdued, and would rather fight to the death than submit to humans.
Naturally, if middle-stage Dao Kings could make 1 million spirit stones so quickly, Shun Long couldn't even fathom how rich the late-stage Dao Kings would be, or even the Dao Emperors.
It was only now that he started to understand why Elders like Elder Xuan could burn high-grade spirit stones to fill their courtyards with qi effortlessly.
And yet, not only did this not make Shun Long depressed, but it actually made him so happy, that any passerby who happened to see the evil smile on his face would end up feeling shivers all over their body before they scurried as far away from him as possible.
With so many resources available in the central region why wouldn't Shun Long ever be happy?
530
At the same time, in these last 4 hours that he toured through the Holy city, Shun Long also learned about the existence of some cultivators who were called Beast Tamers.
Beast tamers could subdue beasts much easier than normal cultivators, and they could even tame those magic beasts much faster than them and even have them follow them into battles, earning the title of beast tamers.
Of course also knew that there were such people in the Night star continent as well, and even in the Desolate East, but they were so few and far between that he never paid any attention to them.
However, in the central region, beast tamers weren't any less important than alchemists or formation masters.
High-level beast tamers were actually treated with the same importance by the powerful families and clans as well as the other forces in the central region, that everyone longed to become a beast tamer as well.
However, although beast tamers enjoyed a high status, it wasn't easy for someone to join their ranks.
Every beast tamer needed to have extensive knowledge of the magic beasts they have to deal with, including the magic beasts' personality traits and how aggressive or docile the beasts were, their natural habitat that they preferred to live, as well as the internal structure of the magic beast and even the prey that they liked to hunt the most, as well as the natural enemies that the magic beasts had.
At the same time, although alchemists also needed to have extensive knowledge of the magic beasts as well, the difference between them and beast tamers was that alchemists also needed to learn the traits of countless medicinal herbs as well as have a powerful spiritual strength that allowed them to mix the ingredients together and concoct their pills.
In comparison, although beast tamers didn't need a powerful spiritual strength, they needed a high combat strength if they wanted to subdue a magic beast.
And yet, although being an alchemist was considered to be a lot harder than being a beast tamer due to the amount of knowledge that the alchemists needed to know, being a beast tamer and having to deal with terrifying and powerful magic beasts was more dangerous in the end, making both professions enjoy an extremely high status throughout the central region.
Thus, it was extremely common for powerful families and clans to vie with each other in order to obtain the favor of powerful alchemists, formation masters and beast tamers alike.
After arriving at the eastern part of the city, Shun Long noticed that even if the inns and the shops weren't as luxurious as the shops that were closer to the center, they didn't seem to have much fewer customers than the top shops.
Finally, an hour later, he stopped in front of the entrance of a medium-sized inn named 'Blue Heaven inn'.
Shun Long knew that he was supposed to meet merchant Ying Gui here today if he wanted to join his caravan and join the Holy sect's mission.
Before entering the inn, Shun Long first took out his sect identifying token and infused his qi inside it, immediately activating the 'Memory recording formation'.
Then, without any delay, he stepped past the inn's entrance and entered the inn.
A fat, middle-aged woman with her hair tied up in a bun approached Shun Long the moment that he entered the inn, and as soon as she spotted his yellow-colored robes which indicated that he was an outer disciple of the Holy sect, she smiled brightly before asking
''Welcome young lord, can I help you?''
Since Shun Long seemed to be an outer disciple of the Holy sect and the woman knew that most disciples of the sect usually enjoyed an extremely high status everywhere within the Holy sect's territory, she didn't think that the young man in front of her had actually chosen her inn to stay and would most likely be here looking for someone.
Indeed, nodding his head at this woman whom he assumed was most likely the innkeeper, Shun Long then asked curiously
''Thank you, is merchant Ying Gui staying here?''
The woman nodded her head with the same smile on her face as her eyes lit up in realization after hearing Shun Long's question, before she pointed towards the depths of the inn and gestured for him to follow after her before she replied
''Of course. Senior Ying Gui is staying in his own courtyard. I was told that if a disciple of the Holy sect really arrived, I should lead you to his courtyard right away. Please follow me.''
Without any delay, the young woman led Shun Long to Ying Gui's courtyard.
A couple of minutes later, Shun Long arrived in front of one of the largest courtyards in the inn, before the innkeeper's voice resounded in the air
''Senior Ying Gui, your guest has arrived.''
The gates of the courtyard opened promptly a few moments later, as Shun Long saw a short, almost obese middle-aged man with a fat nose, big lips, and a greasy forehead, walking towards him with a smile on his face.
With just a glance, Shun Long easily guessed that this was probably the man who had registered the mission, Ying Gui.
His cultivation was at the rank 1 of the Spirit realm, which wasn't impressive for someone of his age, but it was still the norm for a merchant who mostly focused on traveling around instead of fighting or cultivating.
Behind him was a huge middle-aged man, whose height probably exceeded 2.5 meters(8.2ft), dressed in battle armor while a big, silver axe was strapped on his back.
The visual difference between Ying Gui and this man who was following behind him made the gigantic man look even more imposing, deterring anyone who would even think of approaching close to him.
Even though Shun Long had also grown taller in the past 4 years, his height that had reached 1.8m(5.10ft) made him look like a kid in front of this man as well.
However, as Ying Gui approached Shun Long with a smile on his face, the robust middle-aged man frowned when he saw him.