He could have remained inside that environment for much longer. In fact, if he continued cultivating within the tea room, his cultivation speed would probably remain absurdly high. The concentration and purity of Spatial Qi there were simply too extraordinary to ignore. For another cultivator, such an environment would have been an unimaginable treasure, something they might spend their entire lives searching for.
For Stan, however, that abundance had become a problem.
He was advancing too quickly.
Far too quickly.
Although rapid advancement sounded like an advantage, Stan understood that cultivation was never simply a matter of accumulating power as quickly as possible. A cultivator’s foundation needed to be strong enough to support every increase in strength. If cultivation advanced faster than the body, spiritual energy, comprehension, and foundation could adapt, hidden weaknesses would eventually accumulate beneath the surface.
Stan had already noticed subtle signs that his foundation needed time to stabilize. They were not dangerous yet, and there was no immediate threat to his cultivation. Nevertheless, Stan had enough experience to understand that ignoring such warning signs simply because he could continue advancing would be foolish.
He had no intention of becoming powerful quickly only to suffer the consequences of rushing his cultivation later.
He needed time to consolidate what he had gained. His body needed to adapt to the new level of power, his spiritual energy needed to become fully integrated with his cultivation realm, and his comprehension needed time to settle into something stable rather than remaining in a state of rapid expansion. Only after those aspects had caught up with his cultivation would further advancement be truly beneficial.
That was why he had ultimately decided to leave the inheritance space.
Stan walked over and sat down opposite Camilla. He leaned back comfortably, his gaze briefly falling upon her before he noticed the thoughtful expression on her face.
"So," Camilla said.
Stan raised an eyebrow. "So?"
"You dragged me into some spatial space for several days, went deep into cultivation all of a sudden, broke through another realm, and then suddenly decided it was time to come home."
Stan nodded calmly. "That’s basically what happened."
Camilla stared at him for several seconds, clearly dissatisfied with how casually he had summarized the entire experience. "You make it sound incredibly ordinary."
"It was."
"You’re impossible."
Stan laughed quietly.
For a moment, the room fell silent again. The silence was not uncomfortable. After the strange and dangerous environment they had spent the past several days in, the ordinary quietness of the residence was almost relaxing. Neither of them felt any particular need to fill it with conversation.
Then Camilla’s expression suddenly changed.
Her eyes brightened as though she had just remembered something important.
"Oh."
Stan looked toward her. "What?"
"I just remembered something."
Camilla immediately stood and walked toward one of the cabinets. Stan watched her curiously as she opened it and began searching through its contents. A few seconds later, she returned carrying two boxes in her hands.
She placed them carefully on the table between them.
One was a set of Uno cards.
The other was a chess set.
Stan stared at the two boxes for a moment before looking back at Camilla.
"You want to play?"
"Of course." Camilla looked almost offended by the question. "You bought them for me."
"I remember."
"Then why wouldn’t I play?"
Stan smiled faintly. Camilla had always possessed an unusual curiosity toward games. Despite her strength and her experience as a cultivator, she could become surprisingly interested in simple activities that required thought, strategy, or sometimes nothing more than luck. There was something amusing about watching someone who could survive battles involving powerful cultivators become genuinely invested in something as ordinary as a card game.
The contrast was even more ridiculous when Stan considered everything that had happened recently.
He had access to an inheritance left behind by an existence whose power was difficult for even him to comprehend. He had obtained authority over a mysterious spatial domain, cultivated within an environment saturated with Spatial Qi, comprehended deeper aspects of the Void Sovereign Sutra, and broken through another cultivation bottleneck.
Yet after all of that, he was sitting in his residence with Camilla preparing to play Uno and chess.
Stan looked at the two boxes again before shaking his head with a faint smile.
Cultivation, inheritances, ancient powers, spatial laws, and mysterious treasures could wait.
For the moment, apparently, Camilla wanted to play a game.
....
Camilla sat across from Stan with the box of Uno cards resting on the table between them. She picked it up and turned it over in her hands, examining it briefly before looking at Stan with an expectant expression. "Which one first?" she asked, already knowing what his answer would probably be.
"Uno."
"Good."
She immediately opened the box and began arranging the cards. Stan watched her carefully sort through them, noticing how seriously she approached something that was supposed to be nothing more than a casual game. She organized her hand with deliberate precision, grouping cards together and occasionally glancing at the different colors and numbers as though she were preparing for an important battle.
"You know the rules, right?" Stan asked.
Camilla raised an eyebrow and looked at him as though he had just insulted her intelligence. "I’ve played enough times."
"That’s not what I asked."
"I know the rules."
"You’re sure? That og chess"
Her eyes narrowed slightly. "I used the phone to learn more about it.."
"Oh.".
Stan smiled and raised his hands in surrender. "Fine."
With that, they began.
The first few rounds were surprisingly relaxed.
Neither of them seemed particularly concerned about winning or losing, and the conversation continued naturally as they played. However, Stan quickly noticed that Camilla was taking the game more seriously than he had expected. More importantly, the number of cards remaining in the opponent’s hand had to be monitored constantly. Allowing an opponent to reach only a few cards without adjusting one’s strategy could result in an unexpected defeat.