novelraw Chapter 263
Chapter 263
After a moment of satisfaction,
Wang Yu no longer paid attention to the negotiations between Chasing Moon Prefecture and the two major overlords. He knew very well that such talks would not yield results within five or six years.
The previous negotiation with Jade Spirit had already been a lesson learned. This time, with the matter involving the ransom of a Nascent Soul cultivator, the duration would be even longer.
Although the war in Chasing Moon Prefecture had temporarily come to a halt, whether it would resume after the negotiations remained unknown.
Of the twenty-year agreement, only eight years had passed.
Having accomplished so much already, Wang Yu felt mentally fatigued and in need of a period of rest.
The ancient Fang City of You Prefecture was perfectly suited for his secluded cultivation. It was not far from Chasing Moon Prefecture, so if any major event occurred, he would know immediately. Moreover, the city also offered rental cave mansions.
A few days later.
Within a second-rank cave mansion in Ancient Fang City.
This time, Wang Yu’s goal in seclusion was extremely clear. First and foremost was the “Demonic Dragon Armor” currently being nurtured by the Dragonspine Divine Marrow.This treasure was a bloodline true artifact, bound to his very heart-mind and essence.
Based on the Soul-Devouring Evil Armor Technique, it fused divine sense, true essence, and physical body defenses. Incorporated within it were materials such as Living Soul Blood Gold, Ten-Thousand-Year Locust Bark, and Dragon Vein Pearl.
Its potential required no elaboration. At its current nurturing pace, in at most five years it would completely transform into a third-rank lower-grade true artifact.
At that point, further improvement would depend on the cultivation method for a third-rank Body Refiner. According to the records of the Yin Nether Demonic Dragon Art, after reaching the third rank, enhancing the Divine Marrow required not only spiritual medicine but also refining Fiend Qi.
Zombies refined the Fiend Qi for transformation.
For cultivators, unless cultivating special divine abilities, only body refiners would frequently come into contact with baleful qi.
The Nether Demonic Dragon Art could refine yin-type baleful qi and dragon-type baleful qi.
Moon Fiend Qi belonged to the extreme Yin attribute of the Tai-Yin element, the Supreme Lunar aspect. Since Wang Yu possessed a Lunar Yin Fiend Corpse, he was quite experienced in this area and could absorb Fiend Qi directly from the heavens and earth.
If that was insufficient, he could also draw it from the Lunar Yin Fiend Corpse itself.
That corpse was about to advance to mid third rank, and since Wang Yu was temporarily unable to fully suppress it, artificially restraining it was actually beneficial.
As for dragon-type Fiend Qi, that was another matter. It could further refine Wang Yu’s blood and transform it toward true dragon essence. True dragons were beings of the true spirit bloodline, now extinct in this world.
However, flood dragons (jiaolong) still existed. Upon their deaths, they produced the most primitive form of dragon Fiend Qi. Unfortunately, since Wang Yu was entering seclusion, it would be inconvenient to hunt them down, and finding a flood dragon was difficult.
Aside from that, the world’s feng shui formations also contained Fiend Qi formations, which were variations of Earth arrays. If Wang Yu could locate one, his body refinement progress would surge.
For that, he needed to gradually cultivate the Earth Mother Scripture, then gather the qi of the four directions and four seas to refine the Fengshui Compass.
For now, Moon Fiend Qi alone would suffice. As long as he absorbed enough dragon Fiend Qi before reaching the fourth rank, there would be no problem.
He planned to deal with Zhuo Shouqing’s matter before seeking it out.
That was the first goal.
The second was to use the spiritual herbs in his possession to refine the third-rank “Soul Dream Origin Pill” from the Ancient Soul Art, thereby pushing his divine sense to mid third rank and fully mastering the power of the Three Corpses.
This pill formula would take about five years to complete.
On the other hand, the “Cold Chi Alchemy Technique” contained far too much content. Restoring it to full third-rank perfection would take at least one hundred and twenty years.
For Wang Yu, whose cultivation focused on ice-attribute techniques, this alchemy method was invaluable. He would never abandon it, even pushing it toward the fourth rank if necessary.
A fifty-percent increase in the effectiveness of ice-type elixirs, along with the potential for fourth-rank Ice Chi Pill Flames, made it an exceptional and highly compatible top-tier alchemical inheritance.
He remembered setting it aside during his sixteenth year as a Deacon. Now, it was the forty-fourth year and fifth month, just two years shy of thirty years in stasis.
With his current alchemy proficiency, perfection of the pill formula might not yield a supreme-grade result, but an high-grade pill was within reach. After resolving the issue of his spiritual root aptitude, his obsession with supreme-grade pills had lessened.
Nevertheless, for cultivation advancement pills, supreme-grade was still the best.
After the supreme-grade Ice Spirit Pill, the second cultivation pill he obtained after leaving Jade Spirit City was the Ice Lotus Pill, one of his key targets for this seclusion.
He was only three Ice Spirit Pills away from forming a pill barrier, making it the perfect stepping stone. His advancement toward the pinnacle of Foundation Establishment, and even the condensation of the Golden Core, was not far off.
Before officially beginning his seclusion,
He donned the Earth Net Ghost Mask, went to Golden Abundance Tower in Yellow Sand City of You Prefecture, purchased two spiritual materials, and then returned to Ancient Fang City to start his retreat.
That served as a minor safeguard.
As the saying goes: In the mountains, years pass unnoticed;
in the cold seasons, time is forgotten.
The higher one’s realm, the longer each seclusion lasted. Except for those stuck at bottlenecks, all others gained something from each session.
Wang Yu was currently in a phase of rapid advancement. Each day, his insights flowed continuously, and his cultivation rose swiftly, steadily approaching the ninth layer of Foundation Establishment.
…
…
In the blink of an eye, the cycle of seasons turned.
It seemed like only a moment had passed before Wang Yu reached the fiftieth year of his Deacon career, at the end of May, after six years of seclusion.
His original goals were mostly achieved—and even one unexpected matter arose.
[Idle Slot 1: Heavenly Cold Yin Blood Art (Third Rank)]
“Heavenly Cold Yin Blood Art (100/100): Fully Derived, Beyond Derivation.”
This was the Foundation Establishment technique he had obtained from Cold Blood Peak.
Besides expanding the upper limit of true essence, perfecting this art granted an immense enhancement in the quality of his yin-cold true essence.
Once its quality improved, the contained extreme-cold power would naturally intensify, dramatically increasing Wang Yu’s cultivation speed.
The idle slots were extrapolations based on his own existence. Every feedback loop they completed, he could perceive and benefit from directly.
Promotion also meant completion.
It was no different from the techniques he had personally deduced and created.
The effect of the third-rank perfected cultivation technique caused his True Essence to almost turn black. The black solid ice that once required effort to condense could now be formed with a mere thought.
This truly elevated the quality of his True Essence.
It would be greatly beneficial for his future breakthrough to Core Formation. At the very least, the difficulty of condensing mana would decrease significantly. Though it might not compare to using massive amounts of Xuan Essence Flowers during the Qi Refining stage, it could still increase his success rate by ten percent.
Accumulating bit by bit, it was something to be glad about.
His cultivation had also surged another level. In the fourth year since his technique’s advancement, the refining speed of his True Essence increased from “100 strands per day” to “200 strands per day.” (Dual Idle Slot)
It had literally doubled. The benefits of a third-rank perfected technique far surpassed that of a second-rank perfected one, showing that future upgrades would likely bring similar surprises.
Over six years, he had refined three Ice Spirit Pills and formally consumed his first Ice Lotus Pill, increasing his True Essence by a total of 450 drops. His personal cultivation had also reached a new record, increasing by another 240 drops.
Aside from the increase in his True Essence Lake, much of this came from the frequent and intense spell battles. Under the combined effects of his technique and the Profound Ice Bed, his cultivation speed had risen noticeably.
Through the Dual Idle Slot, he had gained an additional 360 drops of True Essence. In total, over six years, his maximum True Essence had increased by 1,050 drops.
At eighty-seven and a half years old, he was at the eighth layer of Foundation Establishment with a True Essence volume of 5,050 drops.
Even without consuming any more pills, within eleven or twelve years he could reach the ninth layer of Foundation Establishment. Perhaps he could not achieve Core Formation before the age of one hundred, but by one hundred twenty or thirty at most, he would truly condense his Golden Core and enjoy an eight-hundred-year lifespan.
If he factored in pills and other bonuses, and sought spirit herbs that could further enhance True Essence, achieving the cultivation speed of a Heavenly Spiritual Root would not be mere fantasy.
Such advancement speed, compared to the three young master of Blood Reversal Sect, was already satisfying.
However.
“The efficiency of the Dual Idle Slot keeps decreasing. Should I upgrade to a Triple Idle Slot?”
Wang Yu only pondered this for a moment.
He decided to wait until after condensing his Golden Core. To obtain Slot No.7, one of his Divine Sense, core mana, or physique must first reach the fourth rank.
The most promising was Divine Sense, but no sign of a breakthrough could be seen in the near future.
Such was his harvest in cultivation.
During this period of seclusion, one of Wang Yu’s greatest gains was his bloodline True Artifact — [Baleful Demon Dragon Armor].
The Dragon Vein Pearl embedded within had been completely absorbed.
The third-rank lower-grade True Artifact had finally taken shape.
With a mere thought, the dragon armor stored within his spine spread across his body, even covering his head, forming a fierce and intimidating full-body armor.
By slightly stirring his blood energy, he could release endless cold aura and dragon roars. It was perfectly compatible with Demonic Dragon Fist and also matched well with Lesser Asura Killing Fist.
In the armored state, Wang Yu felt his physical strength increase by at least sixty percent. Compared to his bare body, it was an entirely different concept.
The Demonic Dragon Fist could now exert two hundred percent of its power.
As armor, its defense was the most evident improvement, capable of resisting attacks of Divine Sense, True Essence, and physical strikes alike. The Demon Dragon Armor was fully integrated with him.
After undergoing the baptism of Lunar Yin Fiend Qi, it gained numerous moon-shadow patterns, appearing slightly gentler. Though his spiritual essence did not grow much, a nail-sized increase still stabilized his realm and advanced him a small step. He was still far from the mid-stage of the third rank.
The Starfall Cold Cauldron, previously dented by the Blood Demon Ginseng, was after all a mid-grade magic treasure and very useful for his alchemy.
After being reforged with Ice Chi Pill Flame, it had gradually returned to its original form.
Now was the time to refine the Soul Dream Origin Pill.
He had obtained part of the materials in the ancient Heavenly Soul Sect medicine garden and, after traveling across several cities in You Prefecture, had finally gathered two full sets.
“Third-rank spirit pill materials are already this hard to find. I wonder what kind of difficulty fourth-rank spirit pills will bring. Cultivation is truly difficult.”
Sighing lightly, Wang Yu officially began the refinement.
With experience from perfecting pill recipes and the aid of the Starfall Cold Cauldron, even if his alchemy skills were a bit lacking, he could compensate through other means.
The extraction and purification step posed no difficulty.
All his configurations exceeded the standard;
the real challenge was the pill condensation step. How many pills could be formed depended entirely on the perfection of his Pill Condensing Seal.
This step was limited by his alchemy skill.
He condensed six pills in total.
This meant supreme-grade was impossible;
at best, they were high-grade. Even so, Wang Yu exerted his utmost effort, spending extra time during the final Pill Nurturing phase.
The first batch took twelve full days to complete.
One low-grade pill, three mid-grade, and two high-grade. Barely acceptable.
The second batch took thirteen days, yielding seven pills in total: three high-grade and four mid-grade.
The variation between the two batches came from the Starfall Cold Cauldron.
After all, his Idle Slot clone did not use a high-grade cauldron, only basic models. A few differences in feedback were inevitable, but the results were not bad.
Five high-grade Soul Dream Origin Pills were enough for him to refine and advance his Divine Sense to mid-third rank. After all, this was a third-rank spirit pill and perfectly matched the Ancient Soul Technique.
There was no reason for failure.
“It begins.”