Chapter 31

After swallowing the Small Origin Pill, as the beeswax was melted by the liquid in his mouth, the Small Origin Pill dissolved instantly in Su Fan's mouth. A wave of heat traveled rapidly from his throat to his spleen and stomach, and immediately, his entire body began to heat up.

From the outside, Su Fan looked as if he had been boiled red, with heat rising from the top of his head.

"Such strong medicinal power!"

Su Fan's expression changed; he had not expected the medicinal power of this Small Origin Pill to be so overbearing. With no time to think, he immediately circulated the internal energy of his Primordial Skill to refine this boiling heat within his body and convert it into internal energy.

At the same time, he began to circulate his internal energy toward the acupoints of his eleventh standard meridian—one, two...

Swift and fierce as a dragon, with an unstoppable momentum, he broke through the barriers of the acupoints one after another, clearing the eleventh meridian, and still had energy to spare.

Seeing this, Su Fan pressed his advantage and charged toward the final meridian.

As his internal energy surged, a storm seemed to whip up within three feet of Su Fan's body, causing the books in front of the mat to flip continuously.

Tianchi, Sect Leader, Taiyuan...

Acupoint after acupoint was forced open by Su Fan's massive internal energy. When the final standard meridian was half-cleared, this surge of internal energy finally exhausted itself, failing to break through the last meridian in one go.

It was a pity, but Su Fan did not feel much regret, nor would he be like some people who would risk breaking through by force.

Even if successful, it would cause certain damage to the meridians and acupoints, which would be even more disadvantageous for the future.

The meridians and acupoints of the human body are quite fragile; once damaged, they are very difficult to repair.

Therefore, when this surge of internal energy was completely exhausted, Su Fan stopped immediately, then slowly circulated his internal energy back to his dantian and began to polish this newly refined internal energy.

After all, internal energy refined by relying on medicinal pills is somewhat unstable and not as condensed as that cultivated bit by bit in daily life.

This seclusion lasted for a full three days. When Su Fan came out again, in terms of internal energy alone, he estimated that only Fan Ming and Zhang Meng were above him.

And that was not even certain, as the internal skill Su Fan cultivated was the Primordial Skill, which held an advantage in internal energy compared to the Huashan Heart Method that Zhang Meng and the others cultivated.

Su Fan did not continue to take the remaining two Small Origin Pills for the time being, because he needed to continue polishing the internal energy in his dantian. He would wait until it was thoroughly polished before continuing to take them; otherwise, continuous consumption would lead to a floating internal energy, which was not a good thing.

According to the insights left behind by predecessors, whether it was clearing the Small Heavenly Circuit or the later Great Heavenly Circuit, it was extremely important for internal energy.

The more condensed the internal energy, the greater the chance of breaking through.

The barriers of the Heavenly Circuit are like a Dragon Gate; the more condensed the internal energy, the more concentrated the power. Breaking a surface with a point is clearly easier than breaking a surface with a surface.

Those loose cultivators in the pugilistic world, without anyone to guide them and being eager for quick success, naturally often ended in failure when breaking through barriers.

This is why great sects are able to produce experts generation after generation.

As a person from a later age, Su Fan placed even more importance on the cultivation insights left by the Huashan predecessors. These were all experiences, whether they were insights from their failures or experiences from their successes. During those years in Huashan, Su Fan had always been careful.

In this regard, Su Fan had an advantage over all other inner sect disciples.

Moreover, in his cultivation, he liked to draw inferences about other cases from one instance, perhaps influenced by the concepts of later generations.

This was also one of the reasons why he could make such remarkable progress.

After coming out of seclusion, Su Fan discovered that there were not many outer sect disciples at the Huashan Branch on Qipan Mountain, only a few, sparring with each other.

After asking, he learned that most people had chosen to follow the merchant caravans.

Becoming a guard for a merchant caravan was quite lucrative; the outer sect disciples who came here were clear about this, and compared to before, their income had increased more than tenfold.

Now, if asked to go back, no one was willing.

Walking down the mountain to the defensive fort, people came and went every day. Because of his reputation, people kept joining the defensive fort. In this area of Liaodong, apart from a few large cities, almost all the Han people outside the cities were flocking to Su Fan's defensive fort.

Therefore, the population of the defensive fort was growing larger and larger. Since defeating the Jianzhou Jurchen last time, it had reached no less than a thousand households, with a full six thousand people, so the defensive fort was also constantly being expanded.

With enough manpower, expansion was quite simple, and using simple cement, the city walls were built very quickly.

Now, the defensive fort could no longer be called a fort; calling it a city was no problem at all.

Here, Su Fan was the local emperor.

With so many people, Su Fan's Hundred-Household Office had expanded again, reaching five hundred men at once. The reason for the expansion was also to prepare for going out to sea in the future.

After all, the sea was not safe. Besides pirates, there were the Portuguese. As far as Su Fan knew, during the Zhengde period, the Portuguese occupied Malacca, so he might encounter a Portuguese fleet when he went out to sea in the future.

These countries had made their fortunes by plundering in the early years, so without a force, they would definitely be robbed.

On the west side of the defensive fort was the military camp of the Hundred-Household Office. Su Fan used his lightness skill and saw Liu Tong training the new recruits.

Su Fan nodded with satisfaction. The order Su Fan gave was to train every two days, not the daily training of later generations, because the nutrition could not keep up.

After all, the productivity of this era could not compare to later generations, and the supplies in Liaodong were even worse.

Although Su Fan had been developing continuously this year, it was still a bit lacking.

However, even with training every two days, the training volume of the military camp was very large, far more powerful than that of the Ming army. As far as he knew, the elite Ming army only trained every three days, and many even trained every seven days. As for the training volume, there was no need to even mention it.

The reason for this was still that supplies could not keep up.

Once these five hundred guards were trained, Su Fan's strength could be said to be absolutely the strongest in the Liaodong area, especially with one hundred heavy cavalry; even the Liaodong Commander-in-Chief would definitely not be a match.

Of course, that was only in the field; attacking a city would definitely not work, as there were too few people.

After inspecting, Su Fan nodded with satisfaction and then returned to Qipan Mountain. The defensive fort was now managed by people from the Su family, which was not bad.

No mistakes had occurred, and everything was under Su Fan's control.

This would be the place where he made his fortune. The income here had already exceeded that of the Su family side; indeed, food and drink were still profitable in ancient times.

However, compared to smuggling private salt, it certainly could not compare; which salt merchant was not a multi-millionaire?

And Su Fan not only smuggled private salt, but also other things; he also smuggled grain.

In over a year, Su Fan had also reclaimed thousands of acres of land at the foot of Qipan Mountain. This area of Liaodong was black soil, so fertile it dripped oil.

It was a pity that the foreign tribes did not know how to farm. Under Su Fan's guidance, an acre of wheat here could now yield a little over four *shi*.

In a year, there were twenty or thirty thousand *shi*. He smuggled some of it directly into the grasslands. As for whether it would strengthen the grassland Tatars...

Su Fan naturally did not care; besides, he was not the only one smuggling.