Chapter 636: Where’s the promised reward?

After finally convincing Yu Hong to take that supreme spiritual treasure and sending him away, Ye Feng began to examine the strange wall before him.
The wall appeared transparent, yet it gave the impression of being a liquid. Most oddly, thanks to his sensitivity to spatial elements, Ye Feng could detect traces of spatial secret patterns within it. Still, he didn’t know how to proceed.
After hesitating for a moment, he finally made up his mind and reached out. The moment he touched it, it felt like touching jelly. The instant he had this sensation, he found himself in another place.
“This is…” Ye Feng came to his senses and realized he was now inside that transparent jelly. A strange pressure pressed in from all directions, preventing him from moving. But this state lasted less than a breath’s time before all the spatial planets within his body began rotating, and the pressure vanished instantly.
Ye Feng, who had previously felt trapped like he was squeezed in concrete, suddenly became like a fish in the sea. The fragments of virtual treasures around him swam freely without restraint.
Once freed from the constraints, his first thought wasn’t to leave this eerie place but to collect all the virtual treasure fragments here.
He tried, only to find that not only could his soul power not leave his body, but his internal energy seemed to be restrained by something, preventing him from launching effective attacks. Fortunately, his storage ring was still attached to his finger, allowing him to collect items—though he had to get them into his hands first.
So, without further delay, he swam around and gathered all the virtual treasure fragments within his sight.
Ye Feng wandered in this area for many days. Without checking his timer, he couldn’t even tell exactly how long, as day and night were indistinguishable here. Of course, the timer showed that he had been wandering for seven days.
In those short seven days, he collected all the virtual treasure fragments within his sight—over three thousand in total. He finally found a tightly closed door as well.

He observed the door carefully. There was no keyhole, so it surely couldn’t be opened with a key—Ye Feng quickly reached this conclusion. At the same time, he noticed that the secret patterns carved on the door were all etched onto metal pieces the size of mosaic tiles. These metal pieces were magnetically attached to the door, with a gap in the middle just large enough for one such tile to move.

“The overall secret pattern on these doors is incomplete…” Ye Feng frowned slightly. He soon identified the key issue. “Do I have to piece together these patterns to be able to pass through?”

Realizing this, Ye Feng immediately set to work, though he felt somewhat overwhelmed. The door was two zhang tall and nearly one and a half zhang wide, while each section of the secret pattern on its surface was only the size of a thumb. In other words, there were over 30,000 of these mosaic-like metal pieces. Assembling them into a complete pattern, like solving a jigsaw puzzle, was a massive task. Since only one piece could be moved at a time, even moving all 30,000 pieces once would take a considerable amount of time.

Ye Feng immersed himself fully in the task, trying again and again, making deductions. A whole year passed before he finally succeeded in assembling a complete pattern.

Just then, a voice that sounded somewhat familiar to Ye Feng rang out—it was the voice of the Heavenly Dao.

“The reason for setting up this checkpoint is merely to prevent powerful beings from higher planes from accidentally entering and disrupting the inheritance. For the first checkpoint, I used a spatial barrier to compress space infinitely until it turned into a liquid state; under such compression, the density of space reaches its limit. Even those who cultivate their bodies in higher planes cannot move at all here. Only those with powerful spatial abilities can lift this restriction. Since such individuals are rare, most intruders are eliminated. The second checkpoint is this door before us. I haven’t given any hints, and to take another step, one must figure out what’s special about this door. Only my disciples would think of the secret patterns and know that by assembling them completely, they can leave. However, this second checkpoint also serves as a test. The secret pattern lines on the small metal pieces on this door can be combined into nine different law patterns. Depending on the number of patterns assembled, different places will be accessed, and different rewards will be obtained. So, please make a careful choice: 1. Pass this checkpoint directly; 2. Continue to deduce the next pattern.”

“I choose the second option!” Ye Feng said without hesitation.

“I respect your choice!” The voice of the Heavenly Dao sounded again. “One more thing: the fewer days it takes to assemble the same number of patterns, the richer the reward will be.”

These words from the Heavenly Dao lit up Ye Feng’s eyes. He sent his soul power into the Void Realm and used the Supreme Comprehension Privilege!

“The Supreme Comprehension Privilege has been used successfully. One use of the privilege has been deducted!” Before the voice from the Void Realm could finish speaking, Ye Feng had already entered a state of sudden enlightenment.

In this state of enlightenment, Ye Feng’s deduction speed was astonishing. In less than a day, he successfully deduced the second pattern.

“Do you want to continue deducing?”

“Yes!”

Three days passed quickly. During these three days of enlightenment, Ye Feng successively assembled four more patterns, bringing the total to five.

But this time, Ye Feng learned from his mistake. Last time, he had used the privilege three times in a row, resulting in him being unable to use it for a year. This time, after using it the first time, he didn’t rush to use it again. Instead, he rested for a day before using it a second time.

With the second use of the privilege, he only managed to assemble three patterns.

After resting for a day, Ye Feng used his third insight privilege. Three full days passed, and finally, just before the end of the insight period, he completed the puzzle of the ninth secret pattern.
“It took 381 days to complete the puzzle of the nine secret patterns!” The voice of the Heavenly Dao sounded again. “Activate the teleportation gate!”
As soon as the Heavenly Dao’s voice faded, the gate automatically opened.
Ye Feng inwardly grumbled, “Wasn’t there supposed to be a reward? Where’s the promised reward?”
“Don’t worry; you won’t be deprived of your reward. It’s just not available now!” The Heavenly Dao’s voice came once more, sounding both distant and yet close by.