Chapter 454

After leaving the Carefree Sect, Song Qingming headed north all the way. Compared to when he came to Mount Guyang, he was not in too much of a hurry this time. He traveled by day and rested by night, and it wasn't until more than ten days later that he slowly passed through the north of the Wei State and entered the Floating Cloud Mountain Range.

Perhaps because the northern monster beast turmoil was near, there were far fewer cultivators on the edge of the Floating Cloud Mountain Range than before. After deep into the territory of the monster beasts, Song Qingming slowly accelerated the speed of his flying sword and rushed toward his destination this time.

After flying all the way for another seven or eight days, the flying sword under Song Qingming's feet finally descended from the sky and stopped beside a large river.

Carefully looking around and finding no traces of any cultivators having been there, Song Qingming walked to a small pool not far from the large river, unfolded a Clear Water Technique, and jumped directly into it. After passing through the dark water flow, Song Qingming quickly arrived at a cave dwelling hidden at the bottom of the pool.

Just as he walked into the gate of the cave dwelling, Song Qingming suddenly saw a scorching fire cloud attacking him. He hurriedly cast a spell to open the Profound Light Armor he had practiced for many years, and with great effort, he finally blocked the blow.

Before Song Qingming could catch his breath, another even more violent fire cloud rushed toward him, making Song Qingming shout loudly in a hurry: "Senior Qingluan, don't be excited, it's me!"

Following this panicked shout from Song Qingming, the fire cloud that was about to reach him slowly stopped and disappeared before Song Qingming's eyes.

Before long, a cyan bird, much larger than Song Qingming, walked slowly toward him with a somewhat arrogant gait.

"So it's you, kid. Didn't you send a message saying it would take a few more days to arrive? Why did you arrive early?"

Hearing Qingluan's mocking voice, Song Qingming slowly squeezed out an awkward smile and said slowly: "I was originally supposed to arrive in two days, but I was afraid that you, Senior, would be anxious waiting here, so I accelerated my pace a bit. Please don't be angry, Senior!"

"Hmph! It was Her Highness who asked me to come here first to wait for you. Isn't it better that you arrived early? Why would I be angry? Do I look like I'm angry?" After Qingluan finished speaking, a pair of large eyes stared tightly at Song Qingming.

"Hehe! No, no, it was Junior who misunderstood. Please don't mind, Senior. These things are what Junior brought specifically for you this time. I will have to trouble you for a period of time, and I hope you won't dislike them."

Seeing that Qingluan's words seemed unfriendly, Song Qingming hurriedly took out a pile of delicious pastries and spirit wine he had prepared early from his storage bag and placed them directly in front of Qingluan.

"You are becoming more sensible. However, I must tell you in advance: I came here because Her Highness sent me to guard this cave dwelling, not specifically to listen to your orders. Don't expect me to help you do anything."

Seeing Qingluan happily putting away all the spiritual items he had just presented, Song Qingming slowly breathed a sigh of relief. Facing this great-aunt who would set him on fire at every turn, to be honest, he was truly a bit afraid of her in his heart.

After temporarily settling things with Qingluan, Song Qingming turned around with a calm expression and walked into a stone door inside the cave dwelling, arriving at a spring eye sealed by a formation barrier.

Looking at the small spring eye in front of him that was constantly emitting pure spiritual energy, a look of joy suddenly appeared on Song Qingming's face. Next, he would prepare to go into closed-door cultivation here and attempt the Golden Core realm again.

The place where Song Qingming was preparing to form his core this time was exactly the Golden Core cultivator's cave dwelling that he, Gao Yuyao, Duan Xueyi, and others had found deep in the Floating Cloud Mountain Range. The small spring eye in front of him was the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye" that they had found together.

The reason Song Qingming did not choose to go to the place where Fire Phoenix was during his first Core Formation, but ran thousands of miles away to this abandoned Golden Core cave dwelling, was precisely for the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye" in front of him.

After discovering this place with Gao Yuyao and the others years ago, under Duan Xueyi's introduction, Song Qingming had heard from her that the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye" had some effect on cultivators breaking through realms and forming cores.

It was just that at the time, Song Qingming only heard her explanation of this item from Duan Xueyi's mouth alone, and he was not sure how much help this "Spirit Machine Spring Eye" could actually be to a cultivator forming a core.

Plus, this place was located deep in the Floating Cloud Mountain Range, with many high-grade monster beasts nearby, as well as Tier 3 or higher monster kings. For an ordinary cultivator to run here to form a core was basically no different from seeking death. After leaving this place, Song Qingming didn't take this matter to heart.

Ever since failing to form his core at Fire Phoenix's place, over the past dozen years, Song Qingming would often analyze the reasons for his final failure and make some preparations in advance for his next Core Formation.

It was under these circumstances that Song Qingming accidentally remembered the cave dwelling he had visited years ago and the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye" inside.

For this reason, Song Qingming specifically searched for many books introducing various spirit veins in the cultivation world and finally found detailed records and introductions of the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye" in front of him. Looking closely, he discovered that it was indeed as Duan Xueyi had said: the pure spiritual energy produced by this "Spirit Machine Spring Eye" did indeed have a certain effect on a cultivator forming a core.

When a cultivator forms a core, they need to spend a large amount of time first purifying the magic power in their body. This point is very important for the later step of condensing the Golden Core. Once the magic power in the body is not pure enough and contains a trace of flaw, the later step of condensing the Golden Core can easily fall short of success. When Song Qingming failed to break through to the Golden Core last time, it was precisely at this step of condensing the core that he fell.

After understanding the role of the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye," Song Qingming quickly made up his mind to set the location of this Core Formation here.

Because it was truly too dangerous to form a core here, after Song Qingming had offered many spiritual items to Fire Phoenix over the years, he finally persuaded her to let Fire Phoenix specifically send Qingluan here to help him temporarily guard this cave dwelling.

With a monster king like Qingluan here, the nearby monster beasts naturally would not dare to come here to disturb Song Qingming's Core Formation. The only worry was that once Song Qingming succeeded in forming his core, the heaven and earth phenomena that would last for several days would certainly attract other monster kings nearby. At that time, with only one monster king like Qingluan guarding this place, he didn't know if she could protect him.

Song Qingming originally wanted to discuss with Fire Phoenix to ask for Long Feng, who had stronger strength, to come and protect him. However, he didn't expect that Long Feng happened to be away during this period, having been arranged by Fire Phoenix to go elsewhere to handle things for her. That was why he had no choice but to invite this great-aunt with a fiery temper, Qingluan, over.

After checking that there were no problems with the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye," Song Qingming hurriedly cleaned up the stone room where he was preparing for closed-door cultivation. After all, he would be staying here for a long time, and constantly facing dust all over the floor would sometimes make people feel unhappy.

Just as Song Qingming set up a barrier at the entrance and was preparing to start closed-door cultivation, Qingluan walked over again and threw a small wooden box to Song Qingming.

"This is what Her Highness asked me to bring to you. Although the effect of this fruit is not as good as the Red-Green Fruit from last time, it should be of some help to your Core Formation. Her Highness said this item is lent to you first, and you still have to find a way to take things to repay her in the future. Don't forget."

After Qingluan finished speaking, she left on her own, no longer caring about Song Qingming, who was standing there in a daze with the small wooden box in his hand.

Because of the failure to form his core last time, which wasted many spiritual items given by Fire Phoenix, Song Qingming was too embarrassed to ask her for Core Formation spiritual items again for this closed-door cultivation. He only tried to borrow a little power from Fire Phoenix to help him guard the place.

Song Qingming also didn't expect that Fire Phoenix, who usually mostly took what she needed from him, would actually take the initiative to let Qingluan bring him a spiritual item to assist in Core Formation this time. He was immediately somewhat surprised in his heart.

Facing this Nascent Soul monster emperor who was usually high and mighty, although Song Qingming was respectful to her on the surface, he had always regarded her as his business partner in his heart. When dealing with her, Song Qingming also tried his best to keep them from owing each other, lest he ask for too much from her, and once he couldn't pay it back, the other party would come to his door.

Facing the small wooden box that Fire Phoenix had taken the initiative to send this time, a wave of warmth flashed through Song Qingming's heart. After opening it and taking a look, he discovered that it contained a white spirit fruit that was not much larger than an ordinary pill.

Although the spiritual energy emitted by this fruit was not as rich as the Red-Green Fruit he had taken years ago, it far exceeded ordinary Tier 2 spiritual items and was certainly a Tier 3 spirit fruit.

Just after taking the small wooden box, Song Qingming heard Qingluan mention that the effect of this fruit was similar to the Red-Green Fruit, and he roughly knew the function of this fruit in his heart, which should also be used to strengthen the cultivator's dantian.

After setting up the barrier formation, Song Qingming calmed his mind, sat back down beside the "Spirit Machine Spring Eye," and patiently meditated to calm his spirit, preparing to start closed-door cultivation to attempt the Golden Core bottleneck.

Because there was an extra spirit fruit given to him by Fire Phoenix, Song Qingming still had to refine this spirit fruit first to strengthen his dantian, just like before his last Core Formation.

After opening the wooden box and swallowing the spirit fruit in one gulp, Song Qingming immediately felt a huge amount of spiritual power appear in his body, rushing straight into his dantian in his abdomen.

This time, because the quality of the spirit fruit he took was worse than the Red-Green Fruit he had taken more than a decade ago, the impact of the spiritual power felt by Song Qingming's dantian was also much better than last time.

Plus, with the experience of refining the Red-Green Fruit last time, Song Qingming did not feel too much pressure facing the impact of this spiritual power now. Instead, he allowed his dantian to absorb and refine more of the spiritual power contained in this spirit fruit.

It took less than a month for Song Qingming to completely refine and absorb the white spirit fruit given to him by Fire Phoenix. He used much less than last time. Although because of taking it directly, he still wasted about 20% of the spiritual power in the spirit fruit, compared to refining the Red-Green Fruit last time, this was already a significant improvement.

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