Every person possesses a Heart-Mind. In a certain sense, the existence of the Heart-Mind is also a kind of vessel for a person.
It is similar to the Purple Mansion.
The only difference is that the Purple Mansion houses the Golden Core or the Nascent Soul, while the Heart-Mind houses the Divine Sense. It also serves as a guardian, protecting a person's essence, energy, spirit, will, and consciousness. Therefore, often, if the Heart-Mind collapses, a person will suffer a mental breakdown or lose consciousness.
Precisely because of this, the existence of the Heart-Mind is of paramount importance.
Unfortunately, there are no cultivation methods for this thing, nor any shortcuts to take. It can only be tempered bit by bit. If the Heart-Mind is sufficiently powerful, it can not only block any forcibly probing Divine Sense from the outside but can also counter-shock it.
Of course, not many people possess such capability.
If the Heart-Mind is like the Purple Mansion, then the Divine Sense is like the Nascent Soul.
Divine Sense is more like a form of will, a form of perception, and a form of spirit.
It can detect things that the naked eye cannot perceive. Often, using Divine Sense to probe is much more detailed and subtle than using the eyes.
The Heart-Mind can only be tempered, and so can the Divine Sense.
Only when a person's essence, energy, and spirit are sufficiently powerful will the Heart-Mind become stronger, and the same goes for Divine Sense.
A powerful Heart-Mind can resist any mental or spiritual technique.
A powerful Divine Sense can manifest into any mental or spiritual technique and can also wander outside the physical body. It is said that the ability to silently kill from a thousand miles away uses Divine Sense to forcibly break through the opponent's Heart-Mind, disintegrate their will, crush their consciousness, and it is even possible to erase their soul.
However, such techniques are too advanced. Ordinary cultivators have neither the opportunity nor the ability to comprehend them.
For ordinary cultivators, Divine Sense is more often used for probing.
After Su Hua released her Divine Sense, she tried to probe the situation within Gu Qingfeng's body.
Anyone with even a little knowledge of medicine would basically use Divine Sense to probe first before treating someone. As long as the other party opens their Heart-Mind, one can easily enter their body. However, what puzzled Su Hua was that after she released her Divine Sense and entered Gu Qingfeng's body, she did not detect anything.
Not to mention the Purple Mansion, she couldn't even detect his foundation. Her Divine Sense didn't feel like it had entered Gu Qingfeng's body; it felt more like it had entered a bizarre space.
The space was pitch black, but she could faintly perceive something in the sky above. This thing was like a sun, emitting a faint, dim red glow.
What place was this?
"Young Lord Chiyan, have you opened your Divine Sense?" Su Hua's voice came through.
Gu Qingfeng responded, "Of course."
"But I haven't detected the situation within your body."
"Didn't I tell you? When my Foundation Establishment failed, my Heart-Mind also mutated. You're currently inside my Heart-Mind."
"Your Heart-Mind?"
Although Su Hua had been mentally prepared, when she encountered this situation, she couldn't help but feel astonished. Having lived two lives, she had come into contact with countless Heart-Minds and seen all kinds, but one as bizarre as Gu Qingfeng's was a first.
It didn't feel like a Heart-Mind at all; it felt more like a mysterious space.
Moreover, what was that cluster of dim red stuff above?
At that moment, Gu Qingfeng's nonchalant voice came again: "Sister Su, be careful. My Heart-Mind is very peculiar."
"I know. Don't worry."
Su Hua tried to see if she could find a point of entry, but she was soon disappointed.
She couldn't find one.
The Heart-Mind had no cracks, no vulnerabilities.
No.
It wasn't that there weren't any.
It was that Su Hua simply couldn't detect anything. The feeling was like suddenly falling into a boundless abyss. There was nothing here. Crying out to the heavens brought no response; crying out to the earth brought no relief. It gave her a deep sense of helplessness because there was simply no place to start.
With nothing there, where could one even begin?
Su Hua thought of that cluster of dim red radiance. She also tried to probe it, but the result was the same—she couldn't detect anything.
It was as if it was clearly right before her eyes, within reach, but when she truly tried to touch it, she found it was very, very far away.
That was exactly the feeling.
"Young Lord Chiyan, what exactly is wrong with your Heart-Mind?"
Gu Qingfeng responded, "That's a question I'd like to ask you too. I'd also very much like to know what's going on with my Heart-Mind."
Inside the Lingyin Garden.
Gu Qingfeng was still sitting in his chair, casually chatting with Ouyang Ye and the others. Behind him, Su Hua was concentrating intently, releasing her Divine Sense to probe.
"Hey, Gu Qingfeng, has Sister Su Hua detected anything?"
Gu Qingfeng shrugged and smiled. "She's probing right now."
Ouyang Ye couldn't stand Gu Qingfeng. Ever since the chest-groping incident, the more she looked at him, the more displeasing he seemed. Especially seeing Sister Su Hua probing for him while this guy leisurely ate Monster Fruits and drank wine.
"Why do you eat these poisonous fruits all day long? Aren't you afraid they'll poison you to death?"
This question wasn't just on Ouyang Ye's mind; Ouyang Feiyue and Master Wenzhu also very much wanted to know. They all knew that Monster Fruits didn't taste good; to be precise, they were very bitter. The key was that these fruits were toxic, easily numbing a person's mental consciousness. Eating too many could drive one mad; otherwise, they wouldn't be called 'demon' fruits.
Although the toxicity of these fruits wasn't severe, eating one or two was fine. However, this guy ate far too many. In Ouyang Ye's memory, it seemed that ever since Gu Qingfeng arrived at Yunxia Sect, he ate them frequently, almost every day. He'd eat one after another. Eating so many every day for at least half a year...
Logically, this guy should have gone mad long ago.
"Minor toxins nourish the body; major toxins harm it."
Gu Qingfeng responded with a smile while eating.
Actually, he ate these fruits without any particular purpose; it was purely for nostalgia.
Because he was an orphan, he had lived alone on Chiyan Ridge since childhood, and Chiyan Ridge was covered with these fruits. Back then, he often went hungry, and many times when he couldn't get enough to eat, he used these things to fill his stomach.
After so many years, returning to his hometown and eating Monster Fruits reminded him of those days.
As for the so-called toxicity, he hadn't cared back then, let alone now.
Over here, they chatted idly. But inside Gu Qingfeng's Heart-Mind, Su Hua's situation wasn't good. After probing for so long, she truly hadn't detected anything. There was really nothing there, utterly empty. She tried probing that cluster of red radiance, but again, she couldn't detect anything.
This feeling was unpleasant, to be precise, terrible, absolutely terrible. Su Hua felt like a headless fly, flying around in a boundless abyss.
That wasn't the key point. The key point was, for some reason, as she probed and probed, a strange, inexplicable feeling gradually crept into her heart.
It was a kind of...
It was also a kind of...