That made Meng Nan's mission in this life an enormous one.
Palm Thunder, Blood Arrow Secret Technique, Giant Spirit Mysterious Technique, Gale Thunder Sword Technique, and Hundred Transformations Cloud-and-Mist Movement Technique.
He had to cultivate and study every one of them.
Then there was his cultivation.
In this life, he had reached the True Qi Body Cleansing stage, but in reality, he was still at Fetal Breath Contemplation. His true realm remained at the Inner Qi Minor Heavenly Cycle, a long way from anything more.
And then there was the main reason Meng Nan had come here this time—
"Alchemy Notes!"
Meng Nan needed a skill to rely on, one that could provide a steady source of cultivation resources. Alchemy was the best choice for now.
Medicinal powders and pills could be used himself or sold, and they had a wide range of uses. The herbs needed for alchemy were also far more common than the ores used in weapon forging or the cinnabar used to make talismans.
Moreover, Meng Nan had spent sixty-four years practicing alchemy in this life. He had abundant experience and a wealth of notes to study and consult.
He had to make use of all that, of course.
Among the prescriptions and pill formulas Meng Nan had learned over the years—
The Alchemy Notes recorded seven remedies for injuries, including ones for stopping bleeding and reducing bruising, mending broken bones and reconnecting torn tendons, and treating injuries to the internal organs. They also included two antidote formulas. All of these were ordinary remedies. Based on his experience, he only needed to choose three or four formulas with common ingredients that were easier to prepare and master them.
Beyond those—
Meng Nan had also learned more valuable formulas that were harder to make.
Qi Circulation Powder.
Yellow Spirit Pill.
Golden Marrow Pill.
Three in total.
Among them—
Qi Circulation Powder worked on both Inner Qi and True Qi.
Yellow Spirit Pill was somewhat more effective.
Golden Marrow Pill was a level above that. It was a pill for those at the True Essence Stage. The Great Pill Meng Nan had developed using Essence Blood had been researched on the basis of the Golden Marrow Pill.
The three pills formed a ladder, perfectly suited to the Inner Qi, True Qi, and True Essence stages.
Things were different from when Meng Nan had been young in this life.
Back then, he had been in Yinlian Village, with little money and little experience. For the first two years, he hadn't even dared to try making pills, afraid he'd go bankrupt.
Later, he had relied on Suoluo Seeds to squeeze money out of Qian Yu and fund his alchemy studies.
But Qian Yu was poor too, with little money to spare, so Meng Nan had still struggled.
Now things were different.
He owned Qingtian Market, and he and his wife, Zhao Xiaoshuang, were among its absolute top brass. Their share of the market's income put them on equal footing with the four peak True Essence cultivators.
They earned nearly a hundred thousand taels of gold each year.
On top of that, Meng Nan practiced alchemy, while Zhao Xiaoshuang hunted demon beasts.
All told, their annual income was approaching a hundred and fifty thousand taels.
They were wealthy.
With wealth and income like this, going back to study alchemy was a piece of cake.
"Just burn money!"
When he had first started studying alchemy, he'd only dared to attempt a batch once every month or two.
Now Meng Nan could make ten or twenty attempts in a single day.
Combined with the alchemy notes and insights he'd accumulated over the years, this practical experience and theoretical knowledge would soon enrich his skills.
He wasn't expecting to match his skills in this life, but at least by the time eight years had passed and he returned to reality, he could reach a level of mastery that would get him through the hardest early stages.
"Qi Circulation Powder costs about twenty taels to make and sells for around a hundred. After sixty-four years of painstaking practice, my success rate is now ninety-five percent."
Meng Nan flipped through his notes, calculating the prospects of his alchemy business.
At his current level, he could make ninety-five batches out of every hundred. With two thousand taels in costs, he could earn nine thousand five hundred.
Over the course of a year, if he made a hundred batches—more than a thousand pills of Qi Circulation Powder—he'd earn seventy-five thousand.
Seventy-five thousand taels of silver.
That was nearly four thousand taels of gold.
It seemed like a lot. Compared to an ordinary True Qi or True Essence Rogue Cultivator, it was an income from heaven.
But compared to running an entire Qingtian Market, it was just a drop in the bucket, hard-earned pocket money.
"The platform is still the biggest moneymaker!"
Meng Nan sighed.
No wonder his younger self in this life had insisted on building a market like this.
But it had taken decades, not to mention True Essence cultivators like Qian Yu and Chen De standing guard, before the market could be safe and free of worry, with no fear of petty criminals.
An ordinary True Qi cultivator or a lone True Essence cultivator could hardly manage that.
That included Meng Nan in reality.
"Alchemy only brings in small money, but it's good for getting through the early stages, and its prospects are decent in the long run too."
Take Meng Nan now.
Just from Qi Circulation Powder, he could conservatively expect to earn four thousand taels of gold a year.
Add Yellow Spirit Pills and Golden Marrow Pills, and his annual income would easily exceed ten thousand taels of gold.
And that was only up to the Golden Marrow Pill.
Besides, he still hadn't fully mastered the latter two pills, and there was room to improve his success rate.
Once he advanced further, earning thirty to fifty thousand a year—or even a hundred thousand—would be no problem.
It wouldn't be any worse than the countless headaches of running such a huge market.
"The only problem is that the early investment is massive!"
After sorting out his thoughts, Meng Nan officially began studying alchemy.
Even with his own notes and a collection of past mistakes to help him, it was still hard to get started.
He could barely manage one successful batch out of ten.
At ten batches a day, that meant two hundred taels of silver going straight down the drain.
And it went on like that, day after day.
Until his success rate reached twenty percent, he would keep losing money.
The more he made, the more he lost.
Only then did Meng Nan truly understand the hardship buried in the words of his diary.
In a place like Yinlian Village—
At the Inner Qi and True Qi stages—
With the income he'd had back then, reaching a solid level of alchemy and learning to make Qi Circulation Powder had been no easy task.
He couldn't help but admire his former self for sticking with it.
Thankfully, the bitter days were behind him.
Now—
He had money and herbs in abundance.
His materials were complete, and he had plenty of fellow practitioners around.
Meng Nan's alchemy improved rapidly, and he was beginning to show real promise.
Over the next several years—
Meng Nan spent most of his time in seclusion.
Cultivation.
Techniques.
Alchemy.
His days were packed from morning to night.
Every few days, he'd spend some time with Zhao Xiaoshuang, strolling around the market to clear his head and gain a deeper understanding of Qingtian Market and this new kind of environment.
He also interacted with people like Qian Yu, Chen De, Wang An, and Chu Zhongliang.
Old acquaintances.
New faces.
He gradually got to know them all.
Combined with his notes, this gave him a much clearer understanding of them—and even of some people who were no longer around, who had disappeared.
He also studied the pills, magical artifacts, talismans, formations, and other things displayed around the market. They had all been cobbled together by half-baked practitioners like him. They couldn't compare to those made and used by true immortals, but they still offered him a glimpse.
Now and then, there were also street vendors in the market, selling all kinds of weird odds and ends.
Meng Nan's horizons broadened by the day.
His days were full.
Time flew.
With pills in plentiful supply, Meng Nan soon reached the Inner Qi Minor Heavenly Cycle.
The next step was much harder.
To advance to the Greater Celestial Circuit, he had to open more acupoints, a feat even more difficult than completing the Minor Celestial Circuit.
In this life, it had taken Meng Nan ten years to reach the Greater Celestial Circuit. After that, he'd languished at that level for twenty years before advancing to the True Qi Stage.
It had taken a long time.
Even now—
He had plenty of notes, plenty of True Qi cultivators in the market, and True Essence cultivators like Zhao Xiaoshuang and Qian Yu to guide him.
He practiced diligently.
He sought advice from time to time.
And he had all kinds of pills and magical artifacts to help him.
The time, place, and people were all in his favor.
But it still took Meng Nan three years to reach the Greater Celestial Circuit.
After that, another four years passed, yet he still couldn't touch the threshold of the True Qi Stage.
"After the Greater Celestial Circuit, the Inner Qi must reach perfection. You hold your essence and guard your unity, then the Inner Qi transforms into True Qi."
"How abstruse!"
Meng Nan could never quite figure it out.
He had all kinds of pills, and his Inner Qi accumulated quickly. Not long after reaching the Greater Celestial Circuit, he had cultivated it to its absolute limit. But he couldn't grasp what it meant to "hold your essence and guard your unity" or to have "Inner Qi flow like water."
In the seventh year of this life, Meng Nan opened his cultivation notes and found the record he'd made when he'd broken through this realm.
"Twenty years of arduous cultivation."
"Trials and battles."
"And the help of a single Great Pill."
Meng Nan pored over the notes, but couldn't find the key.
Arduous cultivation.
Trials.
Battles.
Great Pill.
"Maybe I should try using Essence Blood."
Meng Nan thought of Zhou Boren. He had advanced from Fetal Breath to True Essence in just four years. That speed hadn't seemed all that extraordinary before, but after witnessing his own progress in this life and seeing Zhao Xiaoshuang, Qian Yu, and the others, he understood just how monstrous it was.
"I could use Essence Blood to break through first, then experience the difference between the realms. After that, in reality, I could return to the next life and cultivate the Thunder Illumination Scripture again, breaking through the proper way."
But there were two uncertainties.
First, he didn't know whether this breakthrough would be useful to him or if he'd be able to apply it to his next cultivation attempt.
The second, and more important, concern was that cultivating the Nameless Demonic Art with Essence Blood might affect his temperament and completely change his personality.
Sometimes, a change in temperament couldn't be undone just by abandoning a technique.
If he was still affected after leaving, that would be disastrous.
"This risk—"
Meng Nan shook his head.
It wasn't worth it!
He had examples to learn from.
Zhou Shan had harmed infants just to cultivate.
Zhou Boren had reached True Essence in four years, but he'd become extremely bloodthirsty.
What good was cultivation like that?
During the first sixty-four years of this life, even when he'd had no way out, Meng Nan had only used Essence Blood in alchemy. He had never chosen to cultivate the Nameless Demonic Art.
"If I could resist this temptation when I was at the end of my rope during those first sixty-four years, there's even less reason to take a dangerous shortcut now."
It was only twenty years, give or take.
He had already spent four years cultivating.
After that, he could open two more future timelines. Eventually, he would understand this realm.
He only had to keep chipping away at it.
"Not worth it."
"No need."
Meng Nan's resolve was firm.
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