After that, every morning, a child of seven or eight would kneel before Li Qing's courtyard gate, tears brimming in his eyes. He looked truly pitiful.
This continued for over two months, yet the child remained unwaveringly persistent. Li Qing supposed his mother had forced him to do it.
One night, Li Qing gazed at the layer of frost forming outside the window and couldn't help but sigh softly.
It had been nearly a year since he arrived at Qinghua Pond, and another frigid winter was about to come.
Li Qing took out the Soul Nurturing Bell and refined it with Spiritual Power once as usual before carefully wearing it on his person. For the entire following day, the bell would continuously nourish his Spiritual Sense and strengthen his soul.
Without realizing it, he had repeated this process for four years.
After four years of nurturing, coupled with the many Sky Star Grass he had consumed in the secret realm, the strength of his soul was now comparable to that of a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator.
"If my soul grows a few degrees stronger in the future, perhaps I could even find a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator to possess. Then I could save a Foundation Establishment Pill."
Li Qing laughed at himself, then shook his head and took out a copy of the "Fragmentary Artifact Refining Manual" and a brush from his Storage Bag.
He had bought this incomplete artifact-refining inheritance in Tianhe Marketplace years ago. At the time, the stall owner surnamed Meng had thrown in a copy of the "Wood Sealing Technique," asking only for Li Qing's promise to help repair a Top-grade Magic Tool someday.
Later, Tianhe Marketplace fell, and Li Qing didn't know what had become of that down-and-out cultivator surnamed Meng.
"Now that the Shi