Immortal Mortal Transformation

Zhao Ning and Luo Zhongjie, after a period of repeated practice and experimentation with the Body Tempering Art, finally discovered that due to their lack of spiritual roots, they made no progress after directly cultivating for two months.

Afterward, like Wang Hong, they tried using elixirs or other spiritual items to aid their cultivation. It was effective, but their efficiency in absorbing the spiritual energy was extremely poor, the speed was slow, and much of it was wasted and dissipated.

It seemed that spiritual roots were not only a bridge for absorbing spiritual energy from the outside world but also had a significant impact on absorbing spiritual items after consumption.

Wang Hong, with his limited knowledge, didn't know the specific reasons and could only explore them later.

However, even with poor absorption efficiency, it was still much better than being unable to cultivate at all. At least there was hope for further progress.

The efficiency of absorbing spiritual medicine when cultivating the Henglian Liuhe Gong was much better, but this mortal martial art's body tempering could not reach the height of immortal cultivation techniques. Even if the Henglian Liuhe Gong was cultivated to the highest level, it would not withstand a single blow from a Magic Artifact.

Wang Hong had been pondering how to combine the advantages of both.

Firstly, all cultivation techniques can be divided into two major categories from the aspects of movement and stillness.

One is active exercise, which refers to the body continuously moving during practice. This is further divided into moving form with moving intent and moving form with still intent.

The Henglian Liuhe Gong belongs to the category of moving intent and moving form, using intent to guide qi, where intent goes, strength follows, and simultaneously striking the body.

The second is static exercise. During static exercise, the body is either standing, sitting, or lying down, and the body remains still. It can also be divided into still intent with still form and still form with moving intent.

The Body Tempering Art belongs to still form with moving intent. During practice, the body sits cross-legged and remains still, while consciousness drives the spiritual energy within the body, like dragons and tigers leaping and running throughout the body.

What Wang Hong wanted to experiment with now was to use the circulation method of the Body Tempering Art and combine it with the striking method of the Henglian Liuhe Gong to strike the entire body, which should strengthen the efficiency of spiritual energy absorption.

He remembered that during his last battle with Hu Qing, Hu Qing's powerful strikes had helped him absorb the residual medicinal effects in his body.

After several months of repeated experiments and countless modifications by over forty people, the cultivation technique finally had a preliminary framework.

Wang Hong named this cultivation technique the Immortal Mortal Transformation, which was divided into nine layers. It would be the primary cultivation technique for his subordinate soldiers in the future.

Although this cultivation technique still had many shortcomings and was rough in many places, it was the best they could do at their current level. They could only modify it slowly in the future when their strength and knowledge improved. In any case, the first step had been taken.

In a swamp area filled with black mist, poisonous insects occasionally darted out. Five people, four men and one woman, were cautiously walking through it, heading towards the depths of the Black Dragon Marsh.

The elder with the surname Ge, walking at the front, said, "Everyone, pay attention to concealing your aura. This swamp hides a Tentacle Monster that is highly venomous and attacks by sensing auras. As long as you conceal your aura, even if you stand in front of it, you won't be discovered."

A young cultivator in a black robe with thick eyebrows and large eyes, following the group, asked, "What rank is this Tentacle Monster?"

Another cultivator in the group, surnamed Lei, said, "Fellow Daoist Wang must not have been to this area before and is not familiar with it. Although this Tentacle Monster is a mid-tier first-rank Demonic Beast, due to its highly venomous nature, even late-stage Qi Refining cultivators are reluctant to provoke it easily."

This black-robed cultivator, referred to as Fellow Daoist Wang, was naturally Wang Hong in disguise. With this appearance of thick eyebrows and large eyes, even acquaintances would not recognize him.

During this time, although he refined elixirs day and night and earned Spirit Stones by running his shop, he had not neglected his cultivation. The Body Tempering Art had already reached the second level.

His physical strength had now reached twenty thousand jin, his skin and flesh were as tough as iron and stone, and ordinary low-grade Magic Artifacts could hardly injure him.

He then assumed the alias Wang Kun and joined this temporarily formed adventure team to enter the Black Dragon Marsh to familiarize himself with the terrain.

This swamp was not only inhabited by Tentacle Monsters; countless poisonous mosquitoes buzzed around the group, searching for a place to bite.

Everyone kept waving their hands to drive away the approaching insects. Normally, they could simply release a spiritual energy shield to block the mosquito bites.

However, under the current circumstances of concealing their auras, they could not release spells. Once they cast a spell, it might attract the Tentacle Monster.

Helplessly, they could only swat away these pervasive poisonous mosquitoes.

As Wang Hong drove away the poisonous mosquitoes, he suddenly realized that he didn't need to. The attack power of these poisonous mosquitoes was still worlds apart from low-grade Magic Artifacts. With his current body-tempering cultivation, they shouldn't be able to break through his defenses.

He tried letting a poisonous mosquito approach him while carefully observing with his Spiritual Sense. He saw the mosquito land on his leg, extend its slender proboscis, and silently pierce through his pants.

Then, it released a venomous liquid to wrap around the proboscis and fiercely stabbed towards his skin. The moment it touched his skin, the proboscis broke into several pieces. The mosquito shook its head, and before it could understand what was happening, Wang Hong crushed it with a casual flick of his hand.

Next, Wang Hong casually drove away the poisonous mosquitoes while observing his surroundings.

Besides familiarizing himself with the environment of the Black Dragon Marsh, he had another plan: to transplant as many spiritual herbs from the Black Dragon Marsh as possible into his Mysterious Space.

Although he didn't know what kind of spiritual herbs the introductory mission would require, if he collected all types of spiritual herbs in advance and planted them in his Mysterious Space, he wouldn't have to search for them everywhere when the time came.

Of course, only Wang Hong could pull off such a trick.

Firstly, the spiritual herbs required for the introductory mission must be freshly collected. Although jade boxes and formations could preserve freshness, they were still very different from freshly collected spiritual herbs.

Secondly, each spiritual herb had different growth environment requirements. Cultivating them artificially required a thorough understanding of the growth habits of various spiritual herbs, as well as spiritual fields with different environments to suit their growth. There were tens of thousands of types of spiritual herbs in the Black Dragon Marsh, something even major immortal cultivation sects could not achieve.

This swamp was a vital passage into the Black Dragon Marsh. If there were any rare spiritual herbs, they would have already been collected by predecessors. Wang Hong casually dug out a small gray grass seedling by the roots and put it into his storage bag.

"Fellow Daoist Wang, what's the use of you collecting these young spiritual herb seedlings along the way? These spiritual herbs take at least decades, and up to a hundred years, to be medicinal. We rogue cultivators can at most cultivate one or two types of spiritual herbs; it's difficult to succeed with more," the only female cultivator in the group asked curiously, her bright eyes twinkling.

"Fairy Shi, you may not know, but I've recently been studying the growth habits of various spiritual herbs and need a large variety of them for reference. If Fairy has any spiritual herbs, I'm willing to exchange them for elixirs or Spirit Stones," Wang Hong replied frankly.

"I happen to have some spiritual herbs that I don't need. What kind of elixirs are you planning to exchange them for?" the female cultivator surnamed Shi asked, blinking her eyes.

"That depends on the value of the spiritual herbs. I have Qi Gathering Pills, Rejuvenation Pills, Poison Evasion Pills, and also Spirit Wine that restores spiritual power."

"Does Fellow Daoist Wang also excel at alchemy?" the female cultivator surnamed Shi asked, while the others also looked over.

Wang Hong chuckled, "How could I refine elixirs? I was just fortunate enough to meet an alchemist in Qingxu City. I'm currently running errands for this alchemist."

The others showed expressions of disappointment mixed with envy. Being able to befriend an alchemist brought immense benefits. Alchemists were rare resources, and everyone would need to seek out an alchemist at some point.

Seeing this, several of them took out a few spiritual herbs and exchanged them with Wang Hong for elixirs. Wang Hong accepted them all. The group, having obtained the items they needed, were in high spirits and quickened their pace.

The five of them emerged from the swamp without any major incidents. After passing through a grassland, they finally reached their first destination: Hundred Flowers Valley.

Hundred Flowers Valley spanned three to four li, with various spirit flowers blooming year-round. Only a minority of these were suitable for medicinal use, but they were also excellent choices for brewing Hundred Flowers Spirit Wine.

Hundred Flowers Spirit Wine was brewed using various spirit flowers. The more varieties and higher the grade of spirit flowers, the stronger its efficacy. The purpose of everyone coming here was to gather flowers and make wine.

At this moment, Hundred Flowers Valley was a riot of color, with waves of floral fragrance and various spirit bees and spirit butterflies dancing among them. However, everyone was in no mood to admire the beautiful scenery. They were plucking spirit flowers wholesale, engaging in acts akin to burning the qin and boiling the crane.

Some of these spirit flowers bloomed continuously throughout the year once the spirit grass matured. Others, however, only flowered once every ten or even several decades.

Everyone was only picking the flowers, but Wang Hong still transplanted one or two plants of each spirit flower into his Mysterious Space. The others were already accustomed to this; there were many eccentric individuals in the world of cultivation.

Suddenly, a Yu cultivator in the group pointed to a small tree about two zhang tall and shouted, "Everyone, look quickly! There's a Green-tailed Spirit Beehive here."