Chapter 17: Long Lao

Long Xuan's wild imagination continued to expand...

Soon, he looked out the window and zoomed in on the distance. Once the landscape painting outside was magnified, he had effectively gained the ability of Thousand-Mile Eye.

In fact, his Gu formula contained a large amount of eagle eye, so even without using this ability, his normal vision could already see extremely far—it already counted as a minor Thousand-Mile Eye.

Once the Thousand-Mile Eye was combined with the magnifying eye, the terrifying effect that occurred would make it no surprise to see ten thousand miles away. However, to see such a distance, he would likely need the Pupil Gu to further increase its growth level or undergo a metamorphosis.

The so-called metamorphosis was equivalent to a Gu cultivator's advancement.

As Gu cultivators continuously advanced, the Gu worms naturally had to continuously advance as well to keep up with the Gu cultivator's pace and avoid being eliminated.

But the advancement of Gu worms was not the same system as that of Gu cultivators, so it was not called advancement, but metamorphosis.

The metamorphosis of Gu worms relied entirely on eating. The conditions for each Gu worm to complete metamorphosis were different. The Gu worm did not know what it needed to eat to undergo metamorphosis; it required the Gu cultivator to research it themselves and explore it for them.

Moreover, there was far more than one thing that could satisfy a Gu worm's metamorphosis conditions. Every type of Gu worm had countless metamorphosis routes; some were strong, some were weak. Choosing which route to take was also a matter that required the Gu cultivator to carefully consider.

In short, the metamorphosis of Gu worms relied on eating. It could be eating other Gu worms, solid materials, or even man-made objects like pills.

If they ate the wrong thing, the Gu worm wouldn't complete its metamorphosis even after ten thousand years. If they ate the right thing, they could complete the metamorphosis rapidly, or even undergo several metamorphoses in a short time. The speed of advancement was much faster than that of Gu cultivators.

Precisely because of this characteristic, even if a Gu cultivator's realm was very high, they could cultivate Gu worms matching their own realm in a very short time.

If the Gu cultivator's realm was Spirit Gathering Stage, Essence Refining Stage, Spirit Sea Stage, Soul Departure Stage...

Then the Gu worm's metamorphosis would be Mortal Gu, Spirit Gu, Strange Gu, Demon Gu...

Corresponding one-to-one with the Gu cultivator's realm.

Currently, Long Xuan hadn't found the metamorphosis method for the Heavenly Mechanism Eye, but he was still far from the Essence Refining Stage, so there was no need to worry about such things at all.

One must never think of directly cultivating a Demon Gu at the Spirit Gathering Stage. It could be done, but once a huge gap appeared in the strength of the master and servant, the consequences were obvious without needing to think: either the servant would usurp the master, or the Gu worm would backfire on the cultivator.

Therefore, Long Xuan did not start researching the metamorphosis route for the Heavenly Mechanism Eye; his primary task now was to continue developing the abilities of the Heavenly Mechanism Eye.

At first, Long Xuan didn't take the long-distance vision ability to heart. What did seeing far count for? It couldn't hurt the enemy. But when he looked toward the ground, he became completely unsettled.

Although he didn't yet possess true X-ray vision, he suddenly discovered that the Thousand-Mile Eye could actually be paired with his Golden Finger.

One had to know that his Golden Finger could ignore obstacles, such as spirit insects wrapped in fossils.

His eyes clearly couldn't see the spirit insect, his line of sight completely blocked by thick stone skin, yet he could see the progress deep inside the fossil.

Precisely because his Golden Finger had this characteristic, under the blessing of the Thousand-Mile Eye, he could actually see the progress deep underground.

Although he didn't know what exactly was appearing in the progress, this discovery made his breathing immediately quicken, and he couldn't sit still at all.

What did this ability mean?

It meant he could find underground spirit stone mine veins, metal mine veins, fossil mine veins... and could even discover ancient tombs.

This was simply countless wealth, countless opportunities.

"I'm rich! I'm completely rich!"

Long Xuan paced back and forth in the room excitedly, unable to stop himself from laughing out loud.

"Calm down, calm down, do not be overly joyful or sorrowful."

Long Xuan slowly calmed his excited mood and continued to develop the Pupil Gu's abilities.

Currently, the abilities he thought of were all biased toward support. He wanted attack abilities, preferably forbidden moves.

Long Xuan's brain whirred for a moment, and soon he thought again: since the Pupil Gu's ability was to see the microscopic world, and even see molecules and atoms.

Could he create things by using soul power to change the arrangement of atoms and molecules?

By using soul power to extract extra-nuclear electrons or add extra-nuclear electrons, and changing the number of protons in the nucleus, could he turn one substance into another?

Long Xuan gasped, completely shocked. Clearly, he had also been startled by his own bold idea.

If his soul power was strong enough, strong enough to manipulate the microscopic world, could he become a Creator? His imagination was about to explode.

He didn't know, and he didn't know if his idea was feasible.

He only felt that this idea was truly too terrifying, simply horrifying to the point of being outrageous.

This was not just the power to create all things; if this power were used on an enemy, directly destroying their DNA, or simply turning the whole person into something else, Long Xuan felt a chill just thinking about it.

Unfortunately, his soul power wasn't enough; he couldn't conduct experiments manipulating the microscopic world at all.

Even if this wild idea of his was truly feasible, he wouldn't be able to do it in the short term.

To really develop this power, his soul power would likely need to be extremely terrifying. From what he knew, even becoming a Gu King might not result in such powerful soul power.

Furthermore, even if this wild idea were truly realized, he would likely only be able to create some ordinary things.

Spirit herbs, spirit pills, spirit stones... most treasures contained spirit power. The non-material things contained in the heavenly treasures of this world were far more than just spirit power; how could he create them by manipulating the microscopic world?

Therefore, even if he really developed this ability, he would likely still have to personally search for most cultivation resources; they absolutely could not be created by manipulating the microscopic world.

Not to mention living things; spirit insects, Gu worms, and spirit beasts were absolutely not things he could transform. Soul, spiritual power, lifespan—which of these could be created by manipulating atoms?

Thinking of so many limitations, he slowly calmed down. This move might allow him to possess the ability to turn stones into gold, but becoming a Creator was something he shouldn't even think about.

Since he couldn't research this ability in the short term, Long Xuan stopped thinking about it.

As the first new Gu species to appear in this world, the inventor had the right to name it.

Long Xuan pondered for a moment and named it the Heavenly Mechanism Eye, thinking the name wasn't bad.

After naming the Pupil Gu, his eyes rolled, and he actually used the Thousand-Mile Eye's characteristic to look toward Long Lao's residence...

Inside a simple thatched cottage, a burly old man sat cross-legged on a straw mat, in front of him an alchemy furnace floating in mid-air, controlled by soul power.

Under the alchemy furnace was a cluster of purple flames, emitting a scorching temperature.

He controlled the purple fire to burn under the alchemy furnace, the heat sometimes large, sometimes small. In a short while, the materials inside the alchemy furnace were all burned to ashes.

"Damn it! Failed again!"

"Just three materials short! Just three materials short! Just one step away, why can't I cross it?"

"It's already been ten years! These three materials have worn me down for ten years, truly damn it!"

"The Hundred Flowers Pill is the most potent spirit pill for increasing cultivation in the Spirit Gathering Stage, bar none. As long as I complete the fragmentary formula for the Hundred Flowers Pill, the Long family's strength will rise to another level, but why can't I cross this step!"

"Is this failure because the materials are wrong, or because of the success rate?" The old man roared in a rage, his emotions extremely agitated.

At this time, on a table not far from him, there was a primitive-looking pill formula, emitting an ancient aura, seemingly having been around for years.

But this ancient formula was a fragmentary one, missing a corner. Coincidentally, what was missing were the three most important materials, belonging to the most valuable main materials; not one could be missing.

And coincidentally, this ancient formula was seen through completely by Long Xuan from far away. It was truly too careless; how could one leave a pill formula lying around randomly?

Yet this old man knew nothing about it, having his alchemy techniques and pill formula stolen without knowing, still roaring there.

Long Xuan, while peering there with shifty eyes, muttered to himself: "No wonder this Long Lao has been staying in that broken thatched cottage and not coming out; it turns out he has been in seclusion trying to repair a fragmentary formula."

Don't look at that fragmentary formula as only missing three materials; Long Xuan was an experienced hand at livering Gu formulas. For ordinary people, these three materials might take a lifetime to complete.

The number three was small, but the types of spirit herbs in this world were too numerous to count. Even if one combined them randomly, there were countless ways to combine them.

For others to complete a fragmentary formula, they needed to continuously refine pills, which was time-consuming and laborious, not to mention that you might not be able to judge whether the alchemy failure was due to wrong materials or improper operation.

One had to know that alchemy in any world had a very high failure rate.

The biggest difficulty in experimenting with a pill formula was the cost. As long as the experiment failed once, a furnace of materials would be wasted.

One or two furnaces were fine, but if you kept failing, even if you had a mountain of gold and silver at home, it would sooner or later be exhausted.

Completing a fragmentary formula was a bottomless pit; you might not get results even after exhausting your family fortune.

And what this fragmentary formula was missing were precisely the first three most expensive main materials. You needed to use the most precious materials to continuously experiment, and the high cost invisibly increased the difficulty of completing the fragmentary formula.

However, for things that others couldn't do, Long Xuan could, right?

The materials for the Heavenly Mechanism Eye had all been explored by him; was he still missing these mere three materials?

He didn't need to spend time and effort to conduct experiments to complete the fragmentary formula, and it was zero cost. He could use all kinds of expensive materials without any pressure.

These three materials were a piece of cake for him. Moreover, since the pill formula was called the Hundred Flowers Pill, the materials must definitely be related to flowers. Further limiting the grade of the spirit herbs had greatly narrowed the scope for him.

(End of chapter) Chapter 18