Construction

The jade slip bearing the Bodhidharma Muscle-Tendon Classic was presented through Ning Yongrui's hands, then vanished like a clay ox sinking into the sea, without the slightest reply.

Yun Long seemed to have anticipated this long ago and showed no impatience whatsoever.

He handed both the formulas for the Qi Nourishing Pill and the Body Tempering Pill over to the Ning Family.

For a true small cultivation family, these two pill formulas were actually of rather limited use.

Earning a little gold and silver from ordinary mortals was hardly alluring to cultivators.

The real benefit lay instead in the reputation and connections the Ning Family gradually built among mortal martial artists through the apothecary established with these two formulas.

From time to time, they even acquired rare medicinal herbs from these martial artists that could benefit Qi Refining Stage cultivators as well.

Yet the Ning Family took tireless delight in this, investing far more enthusiasm than usual.

The Yun Clan's share was extremely low, nearly symbolic.

Ning Yongrui then poured the large sums of silver thus saved, without pause, into gathering all kinds of Classics and cultivation methods.

He placed particular emphasis on martial arts and swordsmanship manuals from the mortal world, their sheer variety enough to leave one tongue-tied.

Meanwhile, the Yun Clan developed methodically amid a stillness outsiders found difficult to detect.

All year round, Yun Clan members were rarely seen on the streets of Wanfang Lake Town.

Like a slumbering behemoth, they quietly amassed strength within Evergreen Valley, every clansman seizing every moment to cultivate in earnest.

Unlike Yun Ji, who yearned day and night for a breakthrough, Li Pinghu and Shi Tie showed almost no hope of breaking through to the Qi Refining Stage while cultivating the Wudang Xiantian Gong.

Time had left its marks upon them and worn away whatever lofty ambitions they might once have possessed.

Now that they lived within the Yun Clan, their children had long become their most important source of spiritual solace.

They were far less persistent than Yun Ji when it came to that distant and unreachable Qi Refining Stage.

For this reason, the Yun Clan's affairs, great and small, internal and external, were mostly managed by the two of them, and everything remained in good order.

When they first arrived at Evergreen Valley, the Yun Clan's residence had been built deep within the valley.

Surrounded by mountains on all sides, it had appeared quite secluded.

After that earthshaking battle, Yun Long's manner of doing things seemed to have undergone a subtle change.

He no longer pursued absolute concealment. Instead, with broad strokes and great force, he moved the family's entrance directly to the exit of Evergreen Valley.

A brand-new gatehouse, far grander than the old residence, rose from the ground.

Everywhere within Evergreen Valley, busy scenes could be seen.

The former wasteland was leveled and planned into medicinal fields, a clan training ground, and even new residential areas.

In the Yun Clan's rear courtyard, the old ancestral hall had long vanished without a trace.

In its place stood a brand-new circular structure, personally demolished by Yun Long before he supervised its reconstruction.

Completely different from its former design, this new clan ancestral hall possessed an antique, tranquil charm throughout.

This was the plan ultimately finalized by a highly respected master builder from Wanfang Lake, under Yun Long's detailed descriptions and firm insistence.

At the very center of the ancestral hall, Yun Jiang's memorial tablet stood quietly enshrined.

From the day the ancestral hall was completed, wisps of blue smoke had curled endlessly from the incense burner before the tablet, as though telling of the family's unceasing inheritance.

Outside this circular ancestral hall, precisely twenty meters away, an even larger ring-shaped structure was built.

That was the Yun Clan's newly completed library, like a sturdy barrier that firmly protected the clan ancestral hall at its core.

Inside the library, rows of brand-new bookshelves stretched along the circular walls, neatly stocked with all manner of Classics and cultivation methods the family had recently gathered.

Among them, every manual related to swordsmanship had been carefully placed on the eastern bookshelves.

That was now Yun Hu's exclusive domain.

He practically lived within the library, studying day and night, forgetting food and sleep.

Whenever he gained an insight, he would go to the newly planned circular training ground before the library and practice again and again, testing the sword techniques he had learned.

Through winter and summer, the flickering sword shadows never ceased.

Yun Long still chose to cultivate in the courtyard behind the library, close to the ancestral hall.

His gaze swept across the ancestral hall's outer wall, and understanding dawned in his heart.

The reason the clan ancestral hall had been built in such a unique circular shape was precisely because he had considered it carefully, making it convenient for him to protect it with the Golden Bell Shield in the future.

This flawless, perfectly rounded structure could undoubtedly bring the Golden Bell Shield's defensive power to its utmost limit.

The Golden Bell Shield's wondrous protective effects gave Yun Long much to ponder.

If he could already do this now, then when his strength became even greater in the future, could he truly make an invisible golden bell forever guard the clan ancestral hall, leaving it unscathed through ten thousand calamities?

Perhaps he could also draw upon the Golden Bell Shield's method of activation and the mysteries of its energy circulation.

He could try forging a true golden bell magic treasure with his own hands.

Not only would that greatly increase his combat strength, it could also elevate the golden bell's unique sonic attack to an entirely new level.

But the family was currently so short of people that there was simply no one capable of refining magic artifacts.

Could he, Yun Long, have a chance to become an artifact refiner?

At that thought, Yun Long's gaze deepened unconsciously.

In the end, he let out a soft sigh.

When all was said and done, the family's foundation was simply too shallow.

This was not something as simple as the mortal blacksmithing skills Shi Tie had mastered.

When it came to the profound and unfathomable path of artifact refinement, the entire Yun Clan could be said to know virtually nothing.

The family's shallow foundation was like an invisible shackle. Not only did it bind the Yun Clan's exploration of the path of artifact refinement, but it also revealed a helpless predicament in the finer details of their cultivation inheritance.

Yun Long's gaze drifted unconsciously toward the figure of his father, Yun Ji, at the nearby training ground.

His old man, Yun Ji, cultivated the newly acquired spells with immense enthusiasm and boundless energy.

That fervor practically overflowed Evergreen Valley.

Yet an indescribably complicated feeling rose in Yun Long's heart.

The spells gathered from the various households of Wanfang Lake were truly limited in power.

Yun Ji's six-inch Mysterious Turtle Sea Suppressing Qi was already considered vigorous and pure among mid-grade Qi Refining cultivators.

But these newly learned spells were like a child wielding a massive hammer—clumsy and sluggish, utterly incapable of bringing out the full might of that dense, weighty true qi.

Every time he saw his father cast a spell, with his slightly awkward circulation of true qi and the spell's effects falling far short of expectation, Yun Long felt a profound sense of helplessness.

It was not that his father did not work hard enough.

The truth was that the Yun Clan lacked high-level Qi Refining Stage spell inheritances truly suited to true qi of the Mysterious Turtle Sea Suppressing Qi's caliber.

This predicament was not unique to the Yun Clan.