Qi-Gathering Pill

Qin Wan went straight into the largest Commerce Pavilion in the Marketplace.

Thanks to her status as True Person Lone Moon's personal disciple and acting steward, the shopkeeper didn't dare neglect her in the slightest and personally ushered her into a quiet private room.

When Qin Wan laid the neatly stacked Wind-Riding Talismans on the rosewood table, the well-traveled shopkeeper examined them and couldn't hide the flash of surprise in his eyes.

The talisman lines were not only exceptionally neat, but even more astonishing was the surging, condensed spiritual power flowing through the runes. They had clearly been made recently, and all by the same person.

What kind of talisman master worked this hard?

The shopkeeper was surprised, but didn't press her for an answer.

After a round of shrewd haggling and bargaining, Qin Wan showed the sharpness and resourcefulness of someone born into a merchant clan.

These escape talismans were highly sought after among low-level cultivators, and she ultimately sold them for a good price.

After tallying up her gains, Qin Wan went elsewhere and exchanged half of the proceeds for the cultivation supplies Xia Dong had requested.

The whole deal was handled cleanly and efficiently.

It was still the same Pine Slope Pavilion, hidden amid veils of cloud and mist.

Xia Dong watched Qin Wan push the bundle toward him. His spiritual sense swept over it discreetly, and he instantly knew what was inside. With a gentle expression and an easy motion, he took three Qi-Gathering Pills and fifteen Spirit Stones from the bundle, then lightly pushed them back in front of Qin Wan.

"Wan'er, this batch of supplies was sold so smoothly and without leaving a trace, all thanks to you working things out behind the scenes. This is the reward you deserve. Take it."

Qin Wan immediately waved her hands and hurriedly declined. "Brother Xia, we're sworn siblings now. This was just a small favor. How could Wan'er take your cultivation resources?"

Xia Dong looked at her quietly. "One thing is one thing, and another is another. Over the past few years, I wouldn't have made it this far without you and Senior Lone Moon helping me out. If you don't accept these, how could I bring myself to ask you for help again when I run into trouble?"

Qin Wan pressed her red lips together. She knew that if she kept refusing, she would only seem insincere and distant.

At last, she nodded. "Thank you, Brother Xia."

Holding the Qi-Gathering Pills and Spirit Stones, which radiated pure spiritual energy, Qin Wan couldn't help but feel deeply moved.

When they first met, Xia Dong had been just an ordinary boy who needed her to secretly dip into her own purse to give him Spirit Stones. Yet in only a few short years, Brother Xia had not only advanced by leaps and bounds in martial cultivation, reaching the peak of the Bone Forging Realm, but could now even help her along the path to immortality.

Is this the foundation of a Dao Registry disciple...? Qin Wan murmured silently, her thoughts churning.

She knew very well that Xia Dong had been entrusted with such a lucrative "smuggling" job involving cultivation resources precisely because of his Dao Registry background, which the Bureau of Profound Mysteries had personally verified.

The Great You Dynasty, which now subdued all under heaven and stood at the height of its power, had, in the end, been founded by the thirty-six Dao Registry Clans at the start of the dynasty.

And those original "thirty-six Dao Traitors" had been core figures of immense authority in the various immortal sects and demon sects.

Even though they had chosen to betray their sects and support a mortal dynasty back then, could the countless strands of their inheritance and bloodlines really have been severed completely?

For all they knew, those families might still wield unimaginable influence deep within the immortal and demon sects.

This had always been how aristocratic clans and great houses survived.

At present, the Great You Dynasty Court was indeed powerful. But the heavenly cycles turned, and fortune was as fickle as the wind. Who could guarantee that the immortal sects or demon sects wouldn't rise again one day and once more control the fate of the continent?

What was more, although the Great You Dynasty was currently the continent's hegemon, it still had foreign enemies.

All in all, the Dao Registry Clans would probably always have the right—and ample hidden cards—to calmly choose to stand with the victors.

Qin Wan sighed inwardly.

Then the two said their farewells.

Xia Dong returned to Changchun Medical Hall without a sound.

Night had fallen. Xia Dong locked his door, then deftly slipped into the secret Well-Bottom Secret Chamber.

Sitting cross-legged on the cold stone floor, he took out the supplies one by one and checked them. At last, his gaze settled on the jade bottle containing the "Qi-Gathering Pills."

"Let's see just how effective this immortal pill, worth ten Low-Grade Spirit Stones apiece, really is."

Xia Dong pulled out the stopper and tipped a Qi-Gathering Pill into his hand. The pill was no bigger than a soybean, perfectly round, with faint cloud patterns flowing across its surface. A refreshing, exceptionally pure medicinal fragrance instantly filled the entire chamber.

Without the slightest hesitation, he tipped his head back and swallowed the pill.

Boom!

The moment the pill entered his mouth, it didn't need to be slowly digested by his stomach. It directly turned into an exceptionally pure stream of spiritual power that unfurled inside Xia Dong's body.

Xia Dong's expression tightened. He immediately roused his spiritual sense and circulated the qi-refining method of the Profound Yin Scripture with all his might.

The mana vortex in his dantian began spinning wildly, like a greedy maw gulping down the pure spiritual power.

With the help of the medicinal energy, Xia Dong could clearly feel that the mana in his dantian, originally no thicker than a strand of silk, was steadily growing stronger and more substantial at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Unfortunately, although Xia Dong did everything he could to refine the medicinal energy, his spiritual root had yet to fully transform. Constrained by his limited aptitude, he could only barely retain and refine a tenth of the spiritual power.

As for the remaining nine-tenths...

Hum.

Deep within his sea of consciousness, the mottled Bronze Ancient Bell, as bottomless as a pit, gave a delighted hum.

It released an overbearing, unmatched pull, swallowing up all the spiritual energy that was about to dissipate out of his body.

Over the past few years, Xia Dong had gradually figured out the bell's nature.

This thing not only consumed vast amounts of spiritual power when deriving techniques; even when it floated in his sea of consciousness and maintained its own operation, it silently consumed spiritual energy.

Xia Dong gathered his focus and fully converted that tenth of the spiritual power into his own Mysterious Yin Mana. He could feel that the tenth of the medicinal energy from this single Qi-Gathering Pill was worth half a month of painstaking meditation in this chamber.

Just as Xia Dong was about to stop cultivating and rise, he habitually swept his spiritual sense over the Bronze Ancient Bell in his sea of consciousness.

On the bell's dull bronze surface, covered in the marks of time, a faint trace of gold had appeared!

The golden trace was tiny, like a speck of gold dust stuck to a strand of hair, and it flickered in and out of sight.

If Xia Dong hadn't become intimately familiar with every line on the bell over the past few years, he would have thought he was seeing things.

"This Ancient Bell... could it be that after absorbing enough spiritual power, it can not only derive techniques but also undergo some kind of transformation itself?"

This Ancient Bell was his greatest support for establishing himself in this world of immortal cultivation. If it could advance and transform, who knew what heaven-defying abilities it might unlock?

But he soon cooled down, as if someone had poured a bucket of cold water over him.

"It's been years... I've used my spiritual sense to draw spiritual energy into it day and night, and I've poured in so many Spirit Stones. Now, even after adding this exceptionally pure Qi-Gathering Pill, I've only managed to feed it a fleck of gold thinner than a hair."

"If I want that gold to cover the whole bell and complete its transformation, I'd probably have to drain every Spirit Stone mine in Linyuan Prefecture. How long would that take?"

Xia Dong shook his head and stopped thinking about it. Improving his own cultivation was the most pressing matter.