Chapter 154: Xu Lao and the Hidden Chamber

The great hall where Han Li was located was very peculiar. It was an unusually large cylindrical room, thirty feet in diameter and four or five feet high. Pale red crystals were embedded in the surrounding green rock walls, and there was a thin layer of white sand on the ground, making the entire hall look clean and tidy.

But if someone looked up, they would be astonished to find that there were white stalactites hanging upside down from the ceiling of the hall, and they were everywhere, densely packed. This was actually a rare bell-milk rock cave, which had been slightly modified to form its current appearance.

Three passages were evenly distributed around the hall. Two of the passages were engraved with the character "Artifact" and the character "Alchemy" in ancient script, while the last passage was empty, and there was no indication nearby.

At this time, there was no one in the hall. Han Li scanned it, hesitated slightly, and walked into the passage engraved with the word "Alchemy."

This passage was not long. After turning a corner after a dozen steps, a slightly larger room appeared at the end of the passage. There was a long table in the room, and an elder with a ruddy complexion was standing by the table, looking at Han Li with a smile.

Behind the table stood several dilapidated shelves against the wall, filled with various tripods, raw materials, and some strange miscellaneous items that Han Li had never heard of.

Before Han Li could speak, the elder opened his mouth first with joy: "This little friend, you look very unfamiliar. It's your first time here, right! In this ghost place, fewer and fewer newcomers come! I've long been tired of looking at those dead faces. It's great to have a younger newcomer come here!" The elder shook his head and said, looking quite indecent.

But Han Li had already noticed that the Heavenly Eye Technique had no effect on this old man, and he couldn't see the other party's depth, which showed that the old man was another expert at the Foundation Establishment stage. How could he dare to be negligent!

Therefore, he hurriedly bowed: "This junior greets Uncle-Master. This junior is here at Yuelu Hall for the first time, please give me some guidance, Uncle-Master!" Han Li put his posture very low.

"What's there to not understand, little friend, just ask if you have any questions. Also, my surname is Xu. Call me Uncle Xu or Old Xu. Don't call me Uncle-Master this or Uncle-Master that; I don't like to hear that!" The elder hurriedly corrected Han Li's address to him, as if he cared very much about this.

"That... this junior will obey!" Han Li hesitated for a moment and then agreed indifferently, feeling that the other party was truly a bit strange.

"That's right, now tell me the purpose of coming here." The elder said with satisfaction.

"This junior wants to find some formulas and books related to medicinal pills, and wants to study the way of alchemy." Han Li tried his best to make his words sound roundabout, not hoping to attract this person's attention.

"Alchemy formulas and books? Just go up the stairs!" To Han Li's surprise, the elder didn't have any intention of questioning him, and casually took out a black token and cast a magic formula. Then, a stone ladder leading to the roof appeared out of thin air in the empty space between him and the shelves.

Han Li was overjoyed and hurriedly walked to the stairs. Just as he was about to go up, this Old Xu suddenly revealed a cunning expression.

"Browsing the hidden books on the second floor costs one low-tier spirit stone per hour. You are not allowed to take the original copies away from here. If you want to copy the content, you need to pay an additional copying fee of ten spirit stones per copy."

Before Han Li could step onto the stairs, Old Xu, who was already behind him, said the relevant regulations unhurriedly, which made Han Li's body pause, and he almost wanted to curse out loud.

This fee was too high! Not to mention the copying fee of ten low-tier spirit stones, just the browsing fee of one spirit stone per hour would make many disciples with tight pockets look away.

You must know that a low-tier disciple could only earn twenty or thirty spirit stones a year through various work! Counting the various cultivation consumption and expenses in daily life, the spirit stones that could actually be saved were only a few.

So the other party's charging method was absolutely black-hearted! This made Han Li's impression of this old man turn 180 degrees, and he was truly a big "profiteer"!

Although there was a strange expression on Han Li's face, he didn't stop at all because of the old man's words. Instead, he threw a low-tier spirit stone back to the old man without looking back, and climbed up to the second floor quickly.

"Interesting! Actually not scared away by such a fee, looks like a little rich man. Hehe, looks like another small fortune can be made!" This self-proclaimed Uncle Xu, seeing Han Li's generous action of going upstairs, couldn't help but narrow his eyes into a crescent shape, and rubbed the spirit stone hard on the corner of his clothes before looking at it carefully. His face was completely exposed as a stingy person, and the kind and easy-going expression he had at the beginning had completely disappeared.

At this time, Han Li suppressed the depression in his heart and calmed his mood before carefully observing the things on the second floor.

Unlike the spacious, bright, and countless books and bamboo slips he had imagined, although the room on the second floor was not small, the things placed there were pitifully few.

Two black bookshelves, a dirty table, and a broken chair. This was all the family property in the room. Of course, there were still twenty or thirty yellowed old books on the bookshelves, and a few bundles of broken bamboo slips and two jade cylinders whose original colors could no longer be seen on the table.

"So shabby? Did I go to the wrong place? This is not a hidden book pavilion of a large cultivation sect! It's clearly a dilapidated bookstore of some poor scholar." Han Li was hit hard by the scene in the room. If it weren't for the fear of the old man's unfathomable magic power, he would have had the urge to go downstairs, grab the other party by the collar, and question him severely.

After taking a deep breath, Han Li walked calmly to a bookshelf, then pulled out an old book at random and read it carefully.

"Heaven and Earth Five Elements, corresponding to the five internal organs, gold needle acupuncture points, can transform essence and generate yuan..." He only read a few opening sentences, and was immediately surprised, couldn't help but close the book and look at the cover.

"Hua's Gold Needle Secret Technique" five huge characters appeared before Han Li's eyes.

Han Li's complexion turned ugly. It wasn't that the book was bad; the content recorded in this book was indeed a rare gold needle medical technique in the world, and it even had the miraculous effect of bringing the dead back to life and stimulating the patient's potential. But what did this gold needle technique have to do with alchemy? What made him even more annoyed was that he had read this book countless times back at Doctor Mo's place, and could even recite it backward. This was clearly a medical book from the secular world, how could it appear here openly?

A series of questions appeared in Han Li's mind, making his brows knit tightly, and he was greatly puzzled. But when his gaze fell on the remaining books on the bookshelf, a more ominous premonition shrouded his heart.

Han Li flipped through all the remaining old books one by one. After each book was finished, the gloom on his face deepened, and after he had looked through all the books on the other bookshelf, the expression on Han Li's face was as dark as a storm.

These twenty or so books were not alchemy books at all. Some were secret techniques for curing diseases and saving people, some were prescriptions for strange and difficult diseases, and the most bizarre one was a poison classic written by a poison expert, all of which were books from the secular world.

"One hour is up, if you continue to read, you need to add spirit stones!" Suddenly, the old man downstairs shouted.

Han Li was speechless. Even a pile of trash books like this had to be charged spirit stones? However, when his eyes turned to the items on the table, he still held a glimmer of hope and took out another spirit stone from his body, throwing it downstairs from the stairs.

"Spirit stone received, little friend, continue reading, I won't disturb you!" The old man downstairs said with a smile.

Han Li didn't pay attention to the old man, because he knew very well that for someone who didn't hide his greed, whether he was respectful to him didn't matter anymore. What mattered was whether he could take out spirit stones to continue bringing him benefits.

However, Han Li didn't intend to throw away another spirit stone in vain, so his action of flipping through the bamboo slips on the table was obviously much faster than before, and he only looked at the general content, no longer reading in detail.

Under the soft white light of a huge moonstone on the roof, Han Li's expression changed with the flipping of the bamboo slips, sometimes happy and sometimes sinking, uncertain. After flipping through all the bamboo slips, Han Li put them back in their original place and sighed lightly.

This time, the formulas for several medicinal pills and some experience in matching medicines were truly recorded on these bamboo slips. But unfortunately, judging from the ingredients of these medicinal pills, they were all spiritual medicines with similar efficacy to Han Li's "Yellow Dragon Pill" and "Golden Marrow Pill," and for Han Li, whose Everlasting Spring Technique had reached the eleventh layer, they were already of no use.

In this way, Han Li's only hope was placed on the two jade cylinders the size of a fist, hoping that what was recorded inside would not let him return empty-handed.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 155 =====