Chapter 595: Four Great Forces

The occurrence of this matter was both beyond Han Li's expectations and within his anticipation. (Net)

Although the method of using the power of pills to improve cultivation could lead to rapid progress in magic power, and under some heaven-defying sacred medicines, could even achieve the realm of a thousand miles a day.

But this method was inherently opportunistic, and when the magic power reached a certain level, the power of the original medicinal stones would lose its effect in terms of improving cultivation.

Because, with the refinement of cultivation techniques and the continuous marrow-cleansing and meridian-transforming of the body, the spiritual energy that a cultivator could inhale and absorb at one time was constantly increasing. After reaching a certain stage, the efficiency of extracting spiritual energy from the original pills and the speed at which the cultivator absorbed heaven and earth spiritual energy would not be much different.

In this way, relatively speaking, it naturally manifested as the pills gradually losing their effect. Unless one could take other more effective spirit pills.

The pills Han Li took at the Foundation Establishment stage lost their effect at the Core Formation stage; this was the reason for this principle.

However, previously, this situation only appeared after crossing an entire major realm. But now, without having entered the Nascent Soul stage, these pills had lost their effect.

This was something Han Li had not anticipated beforehand.

Because whether it was the classics he had read before or the insights of Nascent Soul cultivators he had obtained later, all mentioned that pills refined from level-six demon cores were one thing, but pills from level-seven demon cores should be useful before condensing a Nascent Soul. Although compared to before, the effect should have been greatly reduced.

This made Han Li feel somewhat suspicious for a moment.

After carefully pondering it, he could only attribute the premature ineffectiveness of the pills to the drug resistance that hadn't appeared for a long time.

Of course, this was just one conjecture; perhaps it also had something to do with the Bi Yan wine he drank that day, or the spiritual energy of one of the seven great essences of the world he obtained from Mei Ning.

These two things were originally not items for human consumption, and having some unexpected sequelae seemed quite normal.

Han Li didn't intend to get to the bottom of the true reason for the ineffectiveness of the pills.

The matter had already occurred, and the fact could not be changed, so he naturally didn't want to spend more effort on useless work.

He began to ponder his way out.

He still had a level-eight poisonous dragon demon core in his hand, but this item was something that couldn't be bought even with spirit stones. He couldn't bear to refine it into pills to improve his cultivation. There was a great chance of failure in alchemy, and even if one or two pills were refined, this little bit of medicine wouldn't be enough to push him to the False Infant stage.

Now it seemed that he could only cultivate hard like ordinary cultivators to improve his cultivation bit by bit. He hadn't experienced such a snail-like cultivation speed for a long time.

Han Li thought about it and couldn't help but smile bitterly.

Fortunately, he was now only a little short of the perfection stage, and it was estimated that if the spiritual energy provided was abundant, it would take more than ten years to complete.

In this way, he had to find a place with a good spiritual vein to cultivate.

Otherwise, in a place with thin spiritual energy, the cultivation time would be doubled. Han Li naturally wouldn't do such a stupid thing.

But when it came to spiritual veins, Tiannan and the Chaotic Star Sea were a bit different.

The Chaotic Star Sea had few people and many islands, and its area was almost infinitely wide, so there were naturally countless islands of all sizes with spiritual veins. But Tiannan had a large population and a fixed land area.

Although the place was not small, by comparison, let alone places with thin spiritual energy, any place with a spiritual vein was occupied by sects and cultivator families, leaving nothing behind.

Even if there were leftover places with very poor spiritual energy, they were occupied by swarms of loose cultivators, and there was no such thing as leftover land.

In terms of cultivation resources alone, Tiannan could not catch up to the Chaotic Star Sea!

In this way, if Han Li wanted to continue cultivating, he could only mix into a cultivator family or under a certain cultivation sect.

Otherwise, with his ability, although he could sweep through any cultivator family or smaller cultivation sect to forcibly seize some spiritual vein land, he would probably immediately return to the days of being watched by Nascent Soul cultivators.

Han Li was really tired of being chased around all day. He just wanted to honestly condense a Nascent Soul.

"Cultivator family," Han Li pondered for a moment and then excluded it from his choices.

Just by the power of the family, they couldn't occupy any good spiritual veins and couldn't provide the spiritual energy he was satisfied with. Moreover, cultivator families only accepted disciples of their own clan, and it was not easy for outsiders to mix in.

Cultivation sects were different, especially those larger cultivation sects, which not only occupied the best spiritual vein lands but also had many high-level cultivators in the sect. If anything happened, he didn't need to come forward and expose his cultivation, thereby delaying his own cultivation; he could completely enjoy the shade under a big tree.

And after condensing a Nascent Soul, he naturally didn't need to fear anything. It was estimated that by then, even if he revealed his identity, the upper echelon of that sect would only try every possible way to win him over, and they wouldn't be stupid enough to cross him.

Just like that, Han Li, holding the idea of finding a sect with the most abundant spiritual energy, had the "Mount Yunmeng Mountains," which were famous throughout Tiannan and which he had heard people mention when he was in Yue Kingdom, surface in his mind. The three cultivation sects that occupied this spiritual vein naturally became the objects of Han Li's priority consideration.

Since he wanted to join one of the sects, Han Li naturally needed to compare the characteristics, advantages, and disadvantages of the three sects.

Speaking of this, one must mention the general situation of the Tiannan cultivation world over the past hundred years that Han Li had obtained from a small local marketplace.

At that time, Han Li and the two women, Zi Ling, had shared this intelligence. After all, compared to Han Li, the two women were more eager to be familiar with the environment and the general distribution of forces in Tiannan.

The current pattern of Tiannan had changed greatly from when Han Li left.

First of all, there was no longer a situation where forces of all sizes coexisted with countries as boundaries. The entire Tiannan was in a situation where the Demonic Path, the Righteous Path, the Heavenly Dao Alliance, and the Nine Nations Alliance divided Tiannan.

Han Li originally knew about the Righteous and Demonic Paths and the Nine Nations Alliance. But the Heavenly Dao Alliance was a huge organization that appeared only after he went to the Chaotic Star Sea. It was an alliance of more than a dozen large and small countries formed to resist the power of the Righteous and Demonic Paths. Its power was greater than either the Righteous or Demonic Path alone, but if the Righteous and Demonic Paths joined forces, they were not its match.

However, initially, both the Righteous and Demonic sides secretly tacitly agreed to attack the surrounding areas together, and although they annexed several neighboring countries in succession, it also made the relationship between them remain hostile, and there was no talk of joining forces at all.

And the Righteous and Demonic sides also fell into disputes and infighting due to the disputes over the new benefits, and they had no interest in attacking the Heavenly Dao Alliance.

As for the Heavenly Dao Alliance itself, it was just a loose alliance. If the Righteous and Demonic sides didn't take the initiative to attack them, they were more than happy to stay that way.

To let them take the initiative to attack the other side, they didn't seem to have the courage.

In this way, the three forces were in a clever state of balance.

However, what truly prompted no major wars to occur for another hundred years was related to another major force, the Nine Nations Alliance.

The Nine Nations Alliance, in addition to absorbing the seven sects of Yue Kingdom, also absorbed many other cultivator sects and loose cultivators driven out by the Righteous and Demonic Paths, and its strength suddenly increased greatly. They originally thought that this would be enough to suppress the "Fa Shi" of the Mulan Grasslands.

But what they didn't expect was that, whether it was God's will or pure coincidence.

The Mulan tribes that were fighting with them suddenly welcomed powerful reinforcements from the second and fourth largest Mulan tribes, and the number of Fa Shi also doubled.

The fighting between the two sides became even more intense, and after several great battles, both sides suffered heavy casualties. The Nine Nations Alliance was at a disadvantage and was even deprived of some land.

In desperation, the Nine Nations Alliance was forced to send a request for help to the Righteous, Demonic, and Heavenly Dao Alliance, and threatened the three forces that if they were unwilling to send people to participate in the war, they would simply gather their people and let the Mulan Fa Shi in completely.

When this news spread back, even if the Righteous and Demonic sides and the Heavenly Dao Alliance were full of reluctance, they knew that if the Nine Nations Alliance really retreated, with the ferocity of the Mulan Fa Shi, their days would not be easy either, so they had to send some people to reinforce them.

As a result, after another decisive battle, thousands of cultivators died, finally allowing the Nine Nations Alliance to barely withstand the Mulan attack and finally stand firm again.

However, from then on, the Nine Nations Alliance also learned to be clever, and thereafter required other forces to take turns sending people to jointly resist the Mulan attack. Otherwise, if they were the only force to send people and output, and let the other three forces be carefree in the back, they would not agree to it no matter what.

Thus, after a long period of negotiation and wrangling, the four major forces finally reached an agreement with the Nine Nations Alliance as the main force and the other three as auxiliary forces to jointly resist the Mulan people.

It was precisely because of the existence of this agreement that for the past hundred years, although the Righteous and Demonic sides had digested the vast territory they had previously obtained, they did not dare to easily restart the war due to the covetous eyes of the Mulan people and the threats of the Nine Nations Alliance.

As for Xi Kingdom and the two neighboring countries, they belonged to the Heavenly Dao Alliance.

And the "Ancient Sword Gate," "Luoyun Sect," and "Hundred Arts Academy" were even core sects among them.

(Net) ===== CHAPTER 596 =====