Chapter 497: Wu Guo

"That Wu Guo is truly incomparable to those small countries." Looking at the cultivation city before him, Su Fan sighed inwardly. The Huo Ling Cheng before him could be considered one of the largest cultivation cities in the eastern part of the Wu Guo.

This city was built within a valley, surrounded by mountains on all four sides. Four peaks towered into the clouds, and the city walls were built encircling the mountains.

After paying the ten spirit stone entry fee, Su Fan sighed inwardly once more as he gazed at this city of cultivators.

Although he had not used his divine sense to inspect it, this city was definitely not small. A single side of the city wall was seven or eight kilometers long, and he estimated the total area was no less than fifty square kilometers. Such a city was already quite large.

After all, this city was inhabited by cultivators; there were no mortals inside.

Su Fan estimated that the number of permanent cultivators in this Huo Ling Cheng was likely no less than one hundred thousand.

This number was not small; the entire Zheng State likely had no more than two hundred thousand cultivators in total.

A single cultivation city in the eastern part of the Wu Guo had one hundred thousand.

As for the quality, that went without saying. On the main thoroughfare Su Fan walked, he encountered over a dozen Purple Mansion cultivators. As for Golden Core cultivators, he had already encountered one—though, of course, that Golden Core cultivator was inside a six-story domed pavilion.

That domed pavilion was called the Hundred Herbs Pavilion, and it seemed to be a shop selling spirit herbs.

A single medicine pavilion had a Golden Core cultivator presiding over it; one could imagine the rest.

Furthermore, Su Fan knew clearly that this Huo Ling Cheng was built upon a fifth-tier spirit vein and belonged to a cultivation market under the Yuanding Sect.

One had to admit, the Yuanding Sect had a grand vision, directly building a cultivation market on a fifth-tier spirit vein.

Of course, the spirit stones this cultivation market city brought to the Yuanding Sect every day were also massive.

Su Fan knew very well how much cash flow this cultivation city could generate; the Yuanding Sect was truly worthy of being the hegemon of the Southern Wilderness Continent.

"However, such a cultivation city is better for my development."

The higher the foot traffic, the easier it would be for him to earn spirit stones as an Alchemy Master, Talisman Master, or even an Artifact Refiner.

Moreover, this cultivation city had many high-level cultivators, making it more convenient for him to sell third-tier spirit pills. As long as he didn't sell them in large quantities, he wouldn't attract attention.

The Su Family side was now on the right track and didn't require much of his worry, so Su Fan planned to stay here for a few more years to first earn a large amount of spirit stones and then purchase some resources.

At the same time, this city was built on a fifth-tier spirit vein, and the spirit energy was abundant, which was also suitable for his cultivation.

He would accelerate the recovery of his cultivation base. Currently, his cultivation mana was only at the third level of the Purple Mansion, but fortunately, he had reached the peak of the third level and would reach the fourth level of the Purple Mansion before long. As for those bottlenecks, he had none at all.

After strolling through the main thoroughfares of the city, he found that, like the mortal world, it was divided into four regions: East, West, South, and North.

The North District, being closer to the spirit vein, was where various inns and cave dwellings were built.

Some cave dwelling inns even extended into the mountains; places where spirit veins gathered were indeed the best choices for cave dwellings.

The other three districts were considered market trading areas, with the Dong Qu being the largest. However, the Dong Qu was also the place with the most low-level cultivators, and it contained the largest rogue cultivator plaza.

It was clearly built specifically for rogue cultivators to set up stalls.

That area was the most bustling. Su Fan inquired and learned that on ordinary days, there were over a thousand stall owners, and whenever there was a gathering, the number of stall owners could reach tens of thousands.

It was a place where dragons and snakes mingled, but fortunately, this cultivation city had regulations that fighting was strictly prohibited under any circumstances, so it was quite safe. You could engage in verbal sparring, but if you made a move, no matter who you were, you would be suppressed.

It was said that the leader of the city's law enforcement team was a Nascent Soul cultivator, though whether that was true, no one knew.

However, there were indeed many Golden Core stage law enforcers.

After roughly exploring the city, Su Fan first went to find a place to settle down. Su Fan did not choose an inn, as those were generally for short-term stays and were usually preferred by merchant caravans.

Instead, Su Fan chose a cave dwelling carved into the spirit vein.

Finding the person in charge, Su Fan chose a cave dwelling on a third-tier high-grade spirit vein. The cave dwelling was also connected to a fire vein, which could be used for alchemy and artifact refining.

The reason Huo Ling Cheng was named as such was precisely because there was a Fire Spirit Pulse beneath this mountain range, which produced a Fire Spirit Precious Jade every twenty years—one of the auxiliary treasures for Foundation Establishment and opening the Purple Mansion.

Upon arriving at this cave dwelling in person, Su Fan was very satisfied. The spirit energy inside was indeed abundant, even more so than at the Su Family's Flowing Cloud Peak.

Although the cave dwelling was not large, it came with three acres of spirit fields, and they were second-tier spirit fields, which could be used to grow some spirit rice and the like.

The cave dwelling also came with a third-tier defensive array.

It could be said to be quite complete. The cave dwelling was quite good, but the price was not cheap: 1,500 spirit stones per year.

However, this number was nothing to Su Fan.

So he paid for three years directly.

With this, he was settled in. Next, he would earn money and cultivate without neglecting either.

Of course, if he could take in a few disciples, that would also be good.

In the blink of an eye, Su Fan had been in this Huo Ling Cheng for a year and a half.

On this day, Su Fan had just finished refining a batch of Purple Cloud Pills—six pills in a batch. The success rate was already quite high; even if replaced by a fourth-tier low-grade Alchemist, they might not necessarily have Su Fan's success rate.

A single Purple Cloud Pill, placed in Huo Ling Cheng, although certainly cheaper than in small countries like Zheng State, still required 6,000 spirit stones each.

And the cost of a batch of Purple Cloud Pills was only around 16,000. The main expense was that fourth-tier Purple Cloud Ganoderma, which was more expensive and required nearly 10,000 spirit stones.

Even so, he could earn nearly 20,000 spirit stones from this batch of Purple Cloud Pills.

And he spent at most half a month refining this batch of spirit pills.

If he were to refine them endlessly like this, he would likely be able to earn nearly 500,000 spirit stones a year.

Of course, this was only in an ideal scenario. Not to mention whether his crazy selling of Purple Cloud Pills would affect market regulations, just gathering the spirit herbs for the Purple Cloud Pills required time.

It was true that Huo Ling Cheng was a large cultivation market, and third-tier and fourth-tier spirit herbs were easy to find; those places like the Hundred Herbs Pavilion and Spirit Herb Pavilion were not lacking in these spirit herbs.

But if he were always going to purchase them, it would likely attract attention, and that would be troublesome.

An outsider Alchemy Master was quite attractive to many forces.

It was inevitable that someone would play dirty; after all, he had been schemed against back in the Taihe Mountain Range.

Even though he did not fear them in terms of strength—as long as they weren't Nascent Soul cultivators, he feared nothing—it would certainly be troublesome. ===== CHAPTER 498 =====