Blood God Sect

In fact.

Han Yi had always kept a low profile, especially when it came to spending. He never let anyone know how many spiritstones he had in his pocket.

Only a handful of people who often traded pills with him, such as the female cultivators of Little Sea View Peak, guessed that he should be quite wealthy. After all, Han Yi's Alchemy Technique was exceptionally strong.

Although Mystic Pill Sect was a sect centered on alchemy, many people's alchemy skills were about as useful as a chicken rib.

Otherwise, the threshold for the Inner Peak would not be set at Qi Refining Layer 7, but at whatever level of Alchemy Technique one had attained.

Whether on the Inner Peak or the Outer Peak, many disciples had achieved little in alchemy.

And besides alchemy, some people had carved out different paths for themselves. Some excelled at talisman crafting, artifact refining, or formations.

With more than a hundred thousand inner and outer disciples combined, Mystic Pill Sect was practically a miniature world of cultivators.

In such a small cultivation world, the weak needed to lie low. But once one grew stronger, one still needed to loosen up a little.

If one kept suppressing oneself unconditionally, kept cowering forever, sooner or later one's mindset would turn timid and overly cautious.

Then what the hell was the point of cultivating immortality?

There was a matter of balance in it.

And right now, Han Yi felt that it was time to relax a little.

Drunken Immortal Pavilion was one such expression of that.

"Stir-fried young dragon meat, steamed phoenix fish, Nine-Leaf Immortal Peach soup..."

Zheng Hai looked at the dazzling array of spirit food before him and involuntarily swallowed.

Every dish before them had been made from expensive spirit beasts and spirit plants. Six dishes and two jars of spirit wine had cost a full forty-eight spiritstones—a truly lavish spread.

"Eat. What are you staring at?"

It was Han Yi's first time being this extravagant as well. His eyes gleamed as he picked up his chopsticks and began wolfing down the food.

Fine ingredients needed only the simplest cooking to become immortal delicacies.

The spirit food melted the moment it entered his mouth, transforming into a warm current of spiritual energy. Once it entered his body, the mana throughout him trembled, and Han Yi could not help letting out a satisfied moan.

Not bothering with Zheng Hai, Han Yi's chopsticks never stopped as he shoveled food into his mouth again and again.

"Damn it, slow down! Slow down! Leave some for me, you bastard!"

Zheng Hai panicked at once and immediately joined the frenzied feast.

But because he had been dispatched down the mountain, he had wasted more than a year. His cultivation was still at Qi Refining Layer 4, and only at the initial level of the fourth layer, with barely any progress.

Whether in reaction speed or in grabbing dishes, he was far inferior to Han Yi.

In just a single minute.

The six dishes had nearly been scraped clean, and the two jars of spirit wine were already half gone.

That was only because the two had slowed their drinking, wanting to savor it slowly. Otherwise, they would have emptied everything long ago.

"Burp. Delicious, utterly delicious. This one meal has boosted me as much as more than a year of mana growth."

"Han Yi, how many spiritstones did this cost again?"

"What? Forty-eight?"

"Holy shit!!"

After confirming the cost of the meal once more, Zheng Hai sighed in amazement, still wanting more.

"This is probably the best meal I'll ever be able to afford in my life. It's too extravagant, too expensive."

"But I can mooch off your feasts more often in the future."

Han Yi drained the last of the spirit wine in one gulp. Spiritual energy burst open within him and flowed through his hundred meridians and limbs, leaving his entire body feeling wonderful.

He sighed inwardly as well.

The cost of this meal was also quite high for him.

Indulging once in a while was rather nice.

Spirit food could not replace spiritstones, after all. It could not sustain cultivation over long periods, and its markup was far too high. Compared with spiritstones, its value for money was much worse.

"By the way, Zheng Hai, you just came back from down the mountain. Did you hear of anything major happening in the sect recently?"

After the dishes had gone through their flavors and the wine through three rounds, Han Yi suddenly remembered the information he had originally planned to go out and gather today. Recalling that Zheng Hai had just returned from an external assignment, he casually asked.

He did not expect Zheng Hai to know anything.

Unexpectedly, Zheng Hai's expression turned serious. Carrying his wine jar, he leaned closer and said quietly, "There actually is something. I was planning to tell you anyway."

"You know the Blood God Sect, right?"

Upon hearing the words "Blood God Sect," Han Yi abruptly sat upright. The hazy look in his eyes, drunk on spirit wine, instantly widened, and he became clear-headed beyond all doubt.

"I know. Of course I know."

"It's a major sect. In both territory and strength, it is even a notch stronger than our Mystic Pill Sect."

"What happened to the Blood God Sect?"

Han Yi did not show any urgency. It was not that he was not anxious inside, but because he knew Zheng Hai would soon tell him what he wanted to know.

A grave expression appeared on Zheng Hai's face.

"You know that more than a year ago, I applied for an external assignment. The place I was assigned to was Gaodu City, at the westernmost edge of Nanyang Commandery."

"Just mentioning it pisses me off."

"I was sent to Mystic Fire Pill Shop too, and that shopkeeper kept giving me all sorts of tasks, treating me entirely like free labor. Bah! Once I become awesome someday, if I don't kill you, I'm a coward!"

Zheng Hai's tone shifted, and a vicious glint filled his eyes.

"Stop going off track. I'm not interested in your external assignment. Tell me about the Blood God Sect." Han Yi interrupted him.

Zheng Hai looked somewhat embarrassed. He reined in the viciousness in his eyes and continued.

"Not long ago, just as my assignment was about to end, something happened."

"Oh?" Han Yi raised a brow, knowing that Zheng Hai had reached the crucial part.

At that point, Zheng Hai looked around. Finding that no one was paying attention, he lowered his voice.

"Have you heard of the Xiling Spiritstone Vein?"

Han Yi was somewhat bewildered and shook his head.

"All right, let me explain. That vein is near Xiling City, hence the name Xiling Spiritstone Vein. And Xiling City is a city in Taibai Commandery."

"The Xiling Spiritstone Vein is a spiritstone mine. Foundation Establishment cultivators from our sect are stationed there year-round, along with many Inner Peak disciples. They also hire many nearby Rogue Cultivators to excavate spiritstones."

"Ever since that mine was discovered, its ownership has belonged to Mystic Pill Sect."

"But for some reason, the Blood God Sect claimed a while ago that there was a problem with ownership of the mine and that it needed to be renegotiated. Naturally, our people stationed there thought the Blood God Sect was talking bullshit. When they failed to reach an agreement, they started fighting on the spot."

"I heard it was four Foundation Establishment cultivators against four Foundation Establishment cultivators from our sect. If you know anything about the Blood God Sect, you'll know they are extremely good at fighting—far better than Mystic Pill Sect, whose main business is alchemy."

"Though there were four Foundation Establishment cultivators on each side, after a clash, our sect's Foundation Establishment cultivators were defeated and forced to retreat. They were also seriously injured."

"After that, the Xiling Spiritstone Vein was occupied by the Blood God Sect, while our sect's other managers and disciples at the mine all withdrew to Xiling City."

"This caused a huge uproar at the time."

"But the sect suppressed it, and it never spread widely. Back then, I only thought the sect was being spineless and did not think much more of it."

When he said the word "spineless," Zheng Hai secretly glanced around again. Only after seeing that he had not drawn anyone's attention did he continue in a whisper.

"But."

A resentful expression surfaced in Zheng Hai's eyes.

"But what happened next caught me off guard once again."

"After the incident at the Xiling Spiritstone Vein, several other mines belonging to our sect in Taibai Commandery—spiritstone mines, mines of spiritual metals used for artifact refining, and even special underground spirit herb fields—were seized one after another by the Blood God Sect within the span of a month, under all kinds of baseless pretexts."

"During that time, there were several confrontations and killings. I heard our sect lost three Foundation Establishment deacons, and even a Golden Core Stage Supreme Elder suffered minor injuries. Quite a few Alchemy-stage disciples died as well."

"As these incidents continued to ferment, not only Taibai Commandery, but even Gaodu City neighboring Taibai Commandery, became a place where every rustle of wind and cry of a crane set people on edge."

"I sensed that something was wrong, so when my assignment happened to end, I ran back."