Chapter 206: with translation of chapter title

One month later.

Yan Buji hid in a forest in Kandao, boredly opening Storage Accumulation Devices.

After opening them for a whole month, Yan Buji's eyes grew somewhat hollow.

Each Storage Accumulation Device contained only a few low-grade Spiritual Stones and a few First-Tier Spiritual Materials; basically nothing valuable was found.

Moreover, he had to waste time sorting them one by one, so he wasted an entire month.

"Eh?! Finally found something good."

Yan Buji's eyes lit up!

It resembled a bamboo stalk in appearance, yet its whole body was as beautiful as red crystal; Yan Buji instantly recognized it as one of the main materials for forging the Splitting Gold Blade—a Third-Tier Spiritual Material, Scarlet Crystal Bamboo!

Such Spiritual Material is quite rare, growing only in underground water sources in fire-vein lands; ordinary people find it hard to obtain.

"This way, after all the detours, I've finally gathered enough materials to refine the Splitting Gold Blade and the Inlaid Jade Blade, allowing me to open the treasures inside those two source stones." Yan Buji chuckled.

Those two branch-like source stones were secretly taken earlier when he and Hua Fei were acting at the Precious Stone Studio; he had known they contained treasures, but he never dared let others touch them, nor did he have the two specialized stone-cutting Accumulation Devices to do it himself.

He tallied his gains.

He obtained a total of 400,312 Spiritual Stones.

First-Tier Spiritual Materials: 32,000;

Second-Tier Spiritual Materials: 1,103;

Third-Tier Spiritual Materials: 25;

Fourth-Tier Spiritual Materials: 2;

Fifth-Tier Spiritual Material: Dragon Ganoderma.

This Dragon Ganoderma is likely the one produced in Treasure Dragon Land; it's unclear why it ended up in a mundane Storage Accumulation Device, perhaps picked up by a fortunate Lianqi Phase loose cultivator during the massive looting and burning when Lingyu turned into ruins.

Yan Buji calculated that during the Ascension Immortal Assembly, the number of loose cultivators in Huang Du's Lingyu was roughly thirty to forty thousand; after subtracting those from clan powers, there were still over twenty thousand left.

A considerable portion of those loose cultivators entered the Human Smoke Tower seeking opportunity, so the Spiritual Stones he obtained likely came mostly from those cultivator merchants, essentially buying their lives with money.

But as Yan Buji saw, many cultivators were seized by ordinary people; they surely resented it, yet none dared resist, which clearly shows the problem.

It must be that the Treasure Accomplished Emperor's methods are too intimidating; otherwise Yan Buji would not believe cultivators would pay money to ordinary people to buy their lives.

In the end it benefited himself; he estimated the Treasure Accomplished Emperor would be furious to death.

He likely wouldn't care too much about this; with his current strength, if he could truly match Mysterious Gen Dao, the resources he could obtain later would be several times what Yan Buji stole.

"So cultivators aren't lacking resources; they're just too scattered. Gathered together, they'd be enough for my cultivation."

Secluded cultivation!

Without a word, after sorting his gains, Yan Buji directly took out a bottle of the Gold.... Gold Cloud Liquid he had obtained from the Human Smoke Tower, swallowed it, and began cultivation.

As for the raging flood outside, what does it matter to him?

Winter passed, spring came, a year went by.

Yan Buji finally completed the nine turns of mana for the Lianqi Fourth Layer, in one go mastering the final Soft Water Verse of the basic Five Elements Technique!

At this moment, the Five Elements turn, endlessly generating!

Yan Buji's five basic techniques began operating together as his mana circulated; this is his own unique Five Elements Technique!

"Done! Although it took a year, it's different from before when I forcefully broke through to Lianqi Fourth Layer. I have Gold Cloud Liquid in my body, which is better than the residual human red qi inside me! Plus ample resources, Spiritual Stones, and various medicinal aids, the nine turns of mana went quite smoothly!"

Yan Buji happily laughed: "Most importantly, to verify my Five Elements mutual generation, as the theory of my own basic Five Elements Technique, in practice there may be wrong turns; a year's time allowed trial-and-error success, making the five basic techniques interlock into a whole, no longer distinct—this is the perfect state!"

His basic Five Elements Technique has five manifestations: longevity enhancement, Spiritual Fire, Golden Wheel, Chong force, and Water Shield, some actively triggered, some passively.

But as long as he circulates the Five Elements Technique, both attack and defense can be freely adjusted, no longer needing to separately execute a single technique as before.

With the Five Elements mutual generation, his mana strength increased again! The nine-turn technique adapts required resources and difficulty to the cultivator's aptitude and technique; Yan Buji roughly calculated that to break through to Lianqi Sixth Layer, he would need at least a hundred thousand Spiritual Stones.

"My Five Elements Technique is basically complete, but there's no need to delve deeper; aside from the Tree Person Technique I previously obtained, which is an excellent wood-method, I have no better alternatives." Yan Buji thought.

Because achieving Five Elements mutual generation stemmed from his basic techniques being of low quality and low cultivation difficulty.

However, to integrate the Tree Person Technique into his Five Elements Technique, the remaining four techniques must first be found suitable, then explored and cultivated.

Thus, for now Yan Buji has no better way to enhance his Five Elements Technique; it's better to use it as a base to incorporate other techniques for cultivation.

For example, the Wang family's wind-method technique is a good choice; furthermore, one can learn the Wind-Regulating Secret Art, greatly enhancing survivability.

"Continue cultivation."

Yan Buji took out the Wang family technique he had previously obtained—a volume titled "Cheng Feng Gui Yue" (Riding the Wind to Return to the Moon). Since it is a wind-method technique requiring certain aptitude to comprehend, for him just understanding the description took half a year.

Immediately after, Yan Buji, who barely understood it, began attempting cultivation.

Yan Buji's Five Elements Technique was understood through his own internal organs, so its cultivation was completed;

but the wind attribute must be understood and incorporated into his Five Elements Technique by other means.

He chose the concept of the Eight Trigrams.

Wind belongs to wood, which corresponds to the Xun position.

Yan Buji fitted his Five Elements Technique concept into it, using the Eight Trigrams concept instead of the human body's Five Elements, taking the direction of the Xun position from the Eight Trigrams' rotation as the path for his Five Elements Technique cultivation, then incorporating the Cheng Feng Gui Yue technique's cultivation path.

Naturally, it was quite difficult at first.

After all, his Five Elements Technique had already solidified; to change it he must balance other aspects, lest his technique's foundation collapse—lightly causing regression, severely leading to deviation into demonic path.

Precisely for this reason, Yan Buji never dared to indulge in wild fantasies while cultivating; it's better to honestly follow the ideas already explored in the cultivation world.

If that fails, he can still resort to wild fantasies later.

Time slowly passed two years.

Yan Buji went from step-by-step mistakes at the start to finally finding the method to incorporate Cheng Feng Gui Yue; two years is not long, but the consumption involved was unimaginably huge.

The cost of trial and error is unbearable for loose cultivators!

Each cultivation attempt required Spiritual Stones; if mistaken, one had to lose cultivation and start over; once or twice is fine, but Yan Buji persisted for a full two years!

After breaking through to Lianqi Fifth Layer, he had 300,000 Spiritual Stones left; now only 200,000 remain!

If it weren't for the Spiritual Material that can be directly consumed to restore magical power, the loss would probably be even greater than this!

Feeling one's way across the river by stepping on stones, it's inevitable to slip and fall into the water!

Yan Buji didn't want anything to go wrong on his cultivation path, but now he urgently needs to increase his strength, so these consumptions don't matter.

Immediately thereafter, Yan Buji diligently practiced Riding the Wind to Return to the Moon day after day without cease.