Chapter 75: Changes

"Shopkeeper, you really are a good man."

Chen Ci sighed sincerely: "With a friend like you, your old friend must be very happy, right?"

"Stop talking about nonsense. How many do you have? Take them out. By the way, what was this pill called again?"

"Health-Nourishing Pill."

"The name is quite fitting."

The shopkeeper gave a dry laugh: "Don't think I'm suppressing your price. Pills like this that don't involve changes in spiritual energy or primordial Qi are all miscellaneous pills that don't even rank. If it weren't for the fact that there aren't many people in Xishan Prefecture who understand the refining methods for life-nourishing items, I wouldn't even be able to give you this price."

"Yes, yes, you are right, elder."

Chen Ci took out all the pills and put them into a pile: "One hundred and thirty-one pills; count it as one hundred and thirty."

"That is a bit low."

The shopkeeper looked somewhat displeased, but his hands were not slow. He took the pills and opened them bottle by bottle to inspect and count them. It took quite a bit of time, and only then did he count out six hundred and fifty taels of gold and hand them to Chen Ci, settling the transaction.

"Looking at your expression, there should still be some profit to be made, right?"

The shopkeeper put away the Health-Nourishing Pills and said leisurely: "Refine more; this old man has quite a few old friends."

Chen Ci: "."

"I'm just earning some hard-earned money. To refine these few pills, my daily cultivation has fallen behind. Sigh."

Chen Ci sighed, though he wasn't lying.

Pill methods are pill methods; refining pills is like refining methods—it is truly fitting.

"That is true. It is difficult to balance pill method cultivation; only those high-level cultivators can achieve both."

The shopkeeper was uncharacteristically decent for once and offered a few words of comfort: "Listen to your uncle's advice. You are still young. If you don't take advantage of the present to refine more pills, when you get older, you won't be able to refine them even if you want to."

Ptooey!

"By the way, shopkeeper, why does it feel like the flow of people in the market has decreased quite a bit? Did something happen?"

Chen Ci put away the money and asked curiously as he turned to leave.

This time, coming in from Fuyun Market all the way to Xishan Market, he noticed that the popularity of the market had weakened significantly, by about a quarter. Although it wasn't too obvious, some pleasure houses and music parlors had appeared empty, clearly indicating that there were fewer people spending money.

"In Xishan Market, even a single sentence or a piece of news can be sold for money. No one would be happy to tell you if you ask like that."

The shopkeeper glanced at Chen Ci and nodded slightly: "But for the sake of our friendship, I'll tell you this news for free today. A Waterway Superintendent has arrived at Yingchou Ravine on the Liuyun River. He has occupied two hundred miles of the Liuyun River's waters, is collecting passage fees, and has blocked the waterway, so the flow of people in the market has decreased a bit recently."

"Waterway Superintendent? What kind of background does he have to be so formidable!"

Chen Ci was truly envious. Everyone knows how profitable a toll station can be. To be able to block two hundred miles of waterway and collect passage fees—saying he earns a fortune every day would be an understatement.

"Who knows? I only heard he is of spirit-creature origin; I don't know the specifics."

"Doesn't Longhu Mountain care?"

Chen Ci asked curiously. The shopkeeper chuckled, revealing an expression of someone watching the drama: "The interesting part is right here. The talisman decree held by that spirit creature has the official seal of the Liang Kingdom, but the Longhu Mountain experts at the Quanshan Branch seem to be unaware of it. Both sides are currently bickering; there is still fun to be had watching this."

A spirit creature?

That is indeed something worth watching.

Chen Ci rubbed his chin. In this world, cultivation is not the exclusive right of humans. Naturally, other living beings have their place. Among them, there are wild spirit creatures that accidentally obtained spiritual enlightenment, similar to miscellaneous loose cultivators, and there are also tribes and demon kingdoms with cultivation inheritances, like the great profound sects.

The length of the Liuyun River spans the Liang Kingdom and is rich in spiritual energy, so it is not strange for some spirit creatures to be born. But they have always been afraid to provoke humans; usually, they don't even show their figures, fearing they will be captured by passing cultivators.

Chen Ci had truly never seen a spirit creature that could occupy a waterway so blatantly and still be recognized by the Liang Kingdom officials.

To be honest, let alone having seen one, even for spirit creature forces that could amount to anything, he had only heard a little about them in miscellaneous books and idle tales. Even near the Ten Thousand Mountains where the ancestral court of the He Mountain Sect is located, finding a living spirit creature is not an easy task.

Another day of gaining knowledge.

However, it had nothing to do with him. After chatting about the drama with the shopkeeper, Chen Ci immediately went to Fuyun Market to exchange for Spirit Pearls and return to Changping County. Having been out for nearly half a month, many things had been delayed.

Improving True Qi cultivation.

Studying the Five Yin Evil Qi Bag.

Preparing to practice the Five Ghosts Transportation Method.

What Longhu Mountain, what He Mountain Sect, what Waterway Superintendent—they were all too far from his Changping County. Day after day, how could there be so many things to deal with? Cultivating with peace of mind is what matters.

Make money!

Cultivate!

"Six Spirit Pearls, thirteen catties and four taels of Abyssal Sinking Sand—this life of mine is finally looking up!"

True Qi cultivation focuses on consuming Qi and practicing methods, breathing and circulating Qi, and the coordination of acupoints. However, some more subtle tips and experiences are not always explained clearly or in detail.

For example, Chen Ci previously did not know the saying that True Qi cultivation takes thirty-six acupoints as a foundation. Could there really be any difference between thirty-five acupoints and thirty-six acupoints?

But after he personally cultivated to thirty-six acupoints, he discovered that it really was different.

At least in terms of refining Dharma Artifacts, that feeling of greater ease could not be fake. Even the bottlenecks he hadn't understood before seemed to resolve themselves as if by natural order.

Five Yin Evil Qi Bag/Stomach Earth Nourishing Gold Method: 7th-level Prohibition/9/100

A different change had occurred on the Gold Finger panel, but Chen Ci couldn't say for sure whether this change was good or bad for the moment.

Five Yin Evil Qi Bag: Foundation is medium-low, can obtain twenty-nine levels of Prohibition, daily refining of five hundred catties of flesh and blood, one hundred days can obtain one Black Sha, current space is seven cubic units.

Stomach Earth Nourishing Gold Method: Five Yin Gold Evil/2/100 (Daily refining of ten catties of five metals, can nourish a wisp of gold energy; one hundred wisps of gold energy can refine one strand of Black Sha).

The five metals are gold, silver, copper, iron, and tin.

First of all, the appetite of the Five Yin Evil Qi Bag had become even larger. Previously, it only needed flesh and blood for sacrifice; now, it also needed to swallow gold and iron to nourish gold energy, and then use gold energy to refine Black Sha.

Let alone gold and silver, he couldn't even afford ten catties of copper every day.

Fortunately, one catty of wrought iron only costs one tael of silver; if it were pig iron, it would be even cheaper, but this was still a huge expense.

Refining one strand of Black Sha takes three months and consumes over a thousand taels of silver.

Secondly, the quality of the Five Yin Evil Qi Bag had slightly decreased, dropping from the medium-middle thirty-two levels of Prohibition to the medium-low twenty-nine levels of Prohibition. It almost made Chen Ci's little tears fall out of heartache. If there wasn't a qualitative improvement after refining it into Five Yin Gold Evil, then he would have lost everything to his grandmother's house.

"No wonder the He Mountain Sect doesn't explicitly mention that there are other ways to practice the Five Yin Evil Qi Bag, and only teaches apprentices to refine it according to the rules."

Chen Ci gently stroked his Adai. The originally cool bag felt a bit more delicate to the touch and was very comfortable against his body. Seeing that the weather was getting hotter, it actually had some other benefits.

"A Qi Refining cultivator at the early stage can at most refine one or two Dharma Artifacts for self-defense; if a mistake is made during refining, not only is the effort wasted, but it is also easy to incur resentment, so it is better to wait for those Apprentices with ideas to realize it themselves, which saves many twists and turns."

Chen Ci felt a bit wistful; without a teacher to supervise and guide, the difference lies exactly here.

Take this Five Yin Evil Qi Bag for example; although his cheap senior brother Hutou Daoren mentioned that it is common for Inner Sect Disciples of the He Mountain Sect to practice capturing techniques, Chen Ci was already attempting the methods within the Baiyang Sword Art, and having practiced it to this point, there was no room for regret.

"The Five Yin Evil Qi Bag now only requires the accumulation of time to see how effective it is; thinking more about it is of no use."

Swish, swish, swish.

Chen Ci slapped three Soul Fixing Talismans onto the Five Fierce God Statue in succession, looking at the five Fierce Gods inside that were incomparably obedient, lost in thought.

The next step is to study the Five Ghosts Transportation Method.

After all, the path to Longevity for him, Chen, must start from here.

(End of this chapter)