Set Fire to the House

Bang!

Lin Chen opened the front gate and saw that the person outside was actually the Pawnbroker.

He felt a little contemptuous.

"Shopkeeper, you came pretty quickly!" Lin Chen stepped out through the gate. "From now on, this place belongs to you."

He was no bleeding-heart good man.

Quite the opposite—Lin Chen held grudges.

He remembered who had treated him well and who had treated him badly over the past three years.

Unfortunately for the Pawnbroker, he had cheated Lin Chen countless times over those three years and had been placed squarely among the bad people.

"Haha, if there's nothing else, then leave!" the Pawnbroker said coldly, driving him away.

Lin Chen gave a cold smile, said nothing, and left directly.

This courtyard was not so easy to take.

At midnight, a group of men in black quietly slipped into the Lin Family Old Residence.

At that moment, the Pawnbroker was leading people in clearing the place out overnight.

It was all because, while tidying the rooms, they had discovered a Treasure Map.

It indicated that treasure was buried beneath the Lin Family Old Residence.

Remembering the Lin Family's extravagance back when it had flourished, the Pawnbroker immediately decided that the Treasure Map was real.

So he brought people to dig through the night.

They had turned both the front and back courtyards upside down, leaving deep pits everywhere.

"Ah!"

One of the black-clad intruders carelessly fell into one of them.

"Damn it! He even dug traps? That brat's really sly!"

"Hmph! I'll break both his legs later!"

Cursing and grumbling, the group entered the old residence.

After searching around, they found no sign of Lin Chen.

Then someone spotted light flickering in the back courtyard, and they immediately surrounded the area.

"Who's there?" The Pawnbroker was no pushover either, and he was the first to notice them.

"People here to take your life!" Without another word, the men in black drew their weapons and charged.

The Pawnbroker thought they had come to steal the treasure.

He immediately shouted, "Kill them! There'll be hefty rewards!"

Every one of his men was holding a shovel or pickaxe. Hearing there was a reward, they charged forward, brandishing their tools.

"You little bastard, you actually found helpers! Brothers, kill them all! One hundred Gold Coins for every head!"

The leader of the men in black refused to be outdone. With a wave of his hand, the battle erupted at once.

Amid the clanging and banging came screams of agony.

As the smell of blood spread, both sides began fighting for their lives.

None of them noticed that Lin Chen was carrying a Tung Oil Barrel, splashing oil everywhere.

A few minutes later, the Lin Family Old Residence burst into flames.

The nearby residents were quickly drawn by the firelight, and someone cried for help.

"The Lin Family Old Residence is on fire!"

"Everyone, put it out!"

The Lin Family Old Residence stood right next to the City Lord's Mansion.

Tonight, the wind was blowing southeast. With their home on fire, the flames spread in the wind toward the mansion.

The City Lord's Mansion had people patrolling day and night. The moment they saw the blaze, gongs began to sound.

The residents of all Clearwind City were awakened.

Lord Qin was beside himself with rage, howling as he personally led people to put out the fire.

Those useless fools! They were carrying out an assassination, yet they made such a huge commotion. What trash!

He cursed inwardly and rushed to the scene at once.

Lord Qin swept his sharp gaze across the fire, trying to find Lin Chen's traces.

What he did not know was that Lin Chen had already taken the opportunity to sneak into the City Lord's Mansion.

Over the past three years, he had secretly observed the City Lord's Mansion many times.

All for this very opportunity.

In the darkness, he moved like a ghost, weaving between rockeries and thickets.

Avoiding the patrols, he arrived at the back courtyard.

An utterly unremarkable, dilapidated house stood not far away.

It looked abandoned.

But Lin Chen knew that a patrol team constantly circled this area.

Because the two residences were adjacent, he had spent three years secretly observing it.

In the end, he had determined that this was the City Lord's Mansion's Treasure Vault.

He waited patiently until the patrol passed before quietly stepping forward.

The door was locked. He glanced around, then took out two long, narrow iron strips.

He inserted them into the keyhole and jiggled them back and forth a few times.

Click!

The lock opened.

Lin Chen gently removed it, pushed open the door, and slipped inside in a flash.

Then he softly shut the door.

In the darkness, he stood still for several minutes. Only after his eyes adjusted did he begin examining the room.

To his surprise, though the house looked shabby from the outside, it contained a hidden world within.

The furnishings were luxurious, clean, and bright.

Someone should have been living here often.

Lin Chen did not dare waste time and began searching the room.

Things went even more smoothly than he had expected. He found a hidden door in one wall.

Beyond it was a staircase leading downward.

"It's actually hidden underground!"

Lin Chen walked down the stairs. Light immediately appeared before him, and when he turned past a screen, dazzling golden light filled his vision.

"That old bastard has amassed this many treasures?!"

Luminous pearls illuminated the secret chamber as brightly as day.

It was piled with all kinds of gold, silver, jewels, pearls, jade artifacts, weapons, armor...

There were more than twenty large chests, each a full meter square.

By rough estimate, the gold, silver, and treasures here were worth more than ten million Gold Coins.

"System, if you devour all the treasures here, can I gain a thousand years of cultivation?"

Lin Chen's eyes glittered, and he was practically drooling.

[Host, stop dreaming. You are already at the peak of the Body Tempering Realm. To continue increasing your cultivation, you need Spirit Stones.]

"Then what use are all these Gold Coins?" Lin Chen found it rather regrettable.

The system said nothing.

When Lin Chen looked at the gold, silver, and jewels again, they suddenly seemed utterly tasteless.

"What's this?"

Just as he was preparing to burn this place down, he suddenly spotted an Iron Box lying in a corner.

If it had not been identical to the one he carried on him, he would never have noticed it.

Curious, Lin Chen immediately walked over and picked it up.

Click!

The Iron Box opened, and crystalline light flickered at once.

Inside lay ten thumb-sized stones.

The stones resembled glass, with cotton-like wisps slowly drifting inside.

"Could these be Spirit Stones?"

Lin Chen's heart raced. "System, exchange them for ten years of cultivation."

[Ding! Ten Low-Grade Spirit Stones detected. They can be exchanged for ten years of cultivation.]

[First year... nothing gained.]

[Second year... no progress whatsoever.]

[Third year... still unchanged.]

[Ninth year... your realm remains as immovable as a mountain.]

This time was different from before.

Lin Chen felt as though he had truly cultivated for nine years, experiencing it firsthand.

Yet after nine whole years, he was still stuck at the peak of the Body Tempering Realm without budging.

His mindset was starting to crack.

"My Spirit Root really is trash!"

Lin Chen sighed softly.

He only found it regrettable; he was not discouraged.

After all, he possessed such a heaven-defying system. If it did not work this time, there would be next time.

It did not matter!

With that thought, his mood suddenly cleared.

[Tenth year: the host's body has been tempered to the extreme, comprehending the Extreme Path Method.]

[Everything falls into place naturally. Qi Induction is successful, Qi Condensation Success achieved.]

Perhaps because of his state of mind, Lin Chen broke through in the tenth year.

Qi Condensation First Layer!

He only felt an icy-cool aura seep through the pores all over his body, enter his skin, flow into his meridians, and slowly gather.

In just a few moments, it condensed into a Qi Meridian within his body.

He felt entirely different.

His ears and eyes became keen, his senses reaching exquisite detail. He could even hear ants crawling.

"So this is what Qi Condensation feels like?" A smile appeared on Lin Chen's face.

Qi flowed through his meridians, leaving his entire body feeling refreshed and comfortable.

"System, what is the Extreme Path Method? Did you make it up just to comfort me over my trash Spirit Root?"

Compared with breaking through in realm, this interested him even more.

[Host, the Five Elements Root is not the trash Spirit Root spoken of in rumors. It is an essential foundation for cultivating the Extreme Dao.]

[During the Ancient Cultivation Era, spiritual energy was abundant, resources plentiful, and innate lifeforms powerful. There was no need to worry about lifespan limits. In those days, everyone cultivated the Extreme Dao, and the Five Elements Root was the mainstream.]

[As time passed, spiritual energy and resources were consumed in great quantities, leading to insufficient innate foundations and drastically shortened lifespans. Only then did people begin promoting the Single Spirit Root above all else.]

[You may think of a Single Spirit Root as a small puddle. Pump water into it through an arm-thick pipe, and naturally it will fill quickly.]

[The Five Elements Root, meanwhile, is a great reservoir. Filling it through a finger-thick pipe is naturally slow; even when one's lifespan ends, it may still not be full.]

[Cultivation is slow, but the foundation is solid and profound. It is the supreme Dao Root for cultivation.]

Hearing this explanation, Lin Chen slowly nodded. The system's analogy was fitting and easy to understand.

[The so-called Extreme Dao means cultivating every realm to its utmost limit—body, cultivation, and soul alike.]

[Invincible within the same realm, capable of killing those above one's level.]

Now Lin Chen completely understood.

For others, having the Five Elements Root meant being worthless, because it required the polishing of countless years before results could emerge.

Human lifespans were only a brief hundred years. They simply could not endure until then.

But he had the system and could exchange for cultivation time. He could easily complete Extreme Dao cultivation.

At this thought, his mind stirred.

Lin Chen took out the identical Iron Box left behind by his parents.

Click!

He opened the lid and removed the small pouch inside.

Circulating his cultivation, he condensed a strand of spiritual energy. The little pouch unexpectedly made a soft pop.

His consciousness immediately sensed that there was space inside the small cloth bag.

"It really is a Storage Pouch—a ten-meter-square space?!"

Lin Chen was overjoyed. Looking at the gold, silver, and jewels before him, he wore a wicked grin.

Take, take, take!

Even if he had no use for them, he could not leave them for Lord Qin.

"Who's in there?"

Just then, a shout came from outside, and torchlight illuminated the stairway entrance.