Name: Shen Changchuan Realm: Early Stage of the Fifth Layer of Qi Induction Cultivation Art: Elephant Mountain Qi Absorption Art Artifacts: Two Gold Needles (quasi-low-tier artifacts) Soul-Absorbing Bell (mid-tier artifact) One Storage Bag Spells: Golden Bell Technique: 100% (Perfected effect: slightly increased defensive power; negligible experience in Metal-element spell cultivation) Earth-Shaking Technique: 100% (Perfected effect: slightly increased spell power; negligible experience in Earth-element spell cultivation) Water Dragon Technique: 45% Azure Wood Sword Light: 1%
Inside the Spirit Spring Secret Chamber,
Shen Changchuan gazed at the panel before him, his face alight with delight.
Heaven rewards the diligent.
Two months of effort
had brought him tremendous improvement.
First, his cultivation had advanced all the way to the Fifth Layer of Qi Induction.
The magical power within his body had more than doubled!
At the same time,
he had learned four new spells, and had cultivated two of them to perfection.
The Golden Bell Technique rounded out his defenses, while the Earth-Shaking Technique rounded out his control and area attacks.
He had specifically chosen these spells to address his weaknesses.
As a result,
with eight perfected spells at his command, Shen Changchuan might not yet be a warrior with no weak points,
but he now had at least some way to handle just about any situation.
Compared to two months ago,
his strength had improved tremendously!
At the very least, without using any artifacts,
the current him could take on three of his former selves!
Thinking of artifacts,
Shen Changchuan glanced at the artifact section of the panel.
During this time, he had figured something out: whenever he put an artifact into his Storage Bag, that artifact disappeared from the artifact section.
That was why the panel no longer showed the dagger he had looted, or the other quasi-low-tier sword artifact.
As for the reason behind this,
Shen Changchuan couldn't figure it out.
So he simply stopped thinking about it.
By comparison,
improving his own cultivation and strength mattered far more.
"Taking pills really does speed things up. No wonder they're so expensive."
"The thirteen Qi-Nurturing Pills played a big part in getting me this far in just two months!"
That was right.
Shen Changchuan had taken all thirteen Qi-Nurturing Pills he'd looted from the Four Evils of He Mountain to aid his cultivation.
Shen Changchuan had, of course, remembered those scenes in the cultivation novels he'd read in his previous life, where pills left behind by enemies might have been tampered with or poisoned.
But after giving it a moment's thought, he dismissed the possibility.
How to put it?
Alchemy wasn't cooking.
You couldn't just toss in whatever seasonings you liked.
For a pill to take shape, the properties, spiritual energy, and even the attributes of various spirit herbs had to blend perfectly. And during the refinement process, the slightest mistake could blow up the furnace and turn everything to charcoal.
Even a pill that had already formed would become a dud if contaminated by something foreign. That would disrupt the circulation of its medicinal power and make it dissipate rapidly.
Adding something to a pill without damaging it—
that would practically overturn the very foundations of alchemy.
Only a legendary grandmaster of alchemy could manage something like that!
A grandmaster of alchemy
stood on the same level as a True Person like Xuan Dan.
If the Four Evils of He Mountain really had that sort of skill, and had gotten their hands on pills like those,
then Shen Changchuan would accept it.
If he died, he'd have no one to blame but himself!
But as things stood,
the Four Evils of He Mountain clearly didn't have that kind of ability.
"It's just a shame the Qi-Nurturing Pills are all gone. With that, my days of rapid improvement are over."
Gazing at the panel's display of his early-stage Fifth Layer of Qi Induction cultivation,
Shen Changchuan was satisfied, yet couldn't help feeling a touch of regret at his own greed.
Going from the middle stage of the Fourth Layer to the early stage of the Fifth Layer in two months—
that rocket-like pace was something Shen Changchuan never would've dared dream of before.
But when he considered how consuming the Green Origin Water Grass had improved his physical and spiritual aptitudes,
and how ample supplies of cultivation pills had aided him,
such rapid progress wasn't all that surprising.
It was just that the thirteen Qi-Nurturing Pills he'd acquired had now been completely used up.
There was basically no chance he'd keep advancing at this speed.
Unless he could find a new source of spirit pills.
Unfortunately, that wouldn't be easy.
This Border Wilderness was too remote to support an alchemist.
The pills carried by the Four Evils of He Mountain had probably come from some distant, larger city.
Difficult, difficult, difficult!
For a while, Shen Changchuan couldn't think of a good solution.
Perhaps,
if he could get his hands on a legacy of alchemy,
he could use the Progress Bar Panel to grind its progress up, then make pills for his own cultivation?
But Shen Changchuan soon shook his head.
An alchemy legacy was no less precious than a high-tier artifact!
It was a craft that could earn Spirit Stones and give a cultivation lineage enough footing to establish itself!
Even those who knew alchemy kept the knowledge tightly under wraps and wouldn't pass it on lightly.
He'd better forget it.
Shen Changchuan could only put the thought out of his mind.
"I'll have to wait until after the autumn harvest and see if the merchant caravans that come to Wu Family Market have any spirit pills for sale."
"If not, I'll have to consider going to Qing City."
Shen Changchuan felt a little helpless and let out a faint sigh.
After two months in seclusion,
Shen Changchuan had reaped a handsome harvest.
But time had run short, and he hadn't been able to cultivate every spell left behind by the Four Evils of He Mountain.
Because of that,
the autumn harvest had already arrived.
Across the Spirit Fields,
golden Spirit Grain stretched in an unbroken expanse, gleaming brilliantly beneath the sun.
When the wind blew, waves of gold rippled across the fields.
Shen Changchuan didn't dare be careless about the major task of harvesting the Spirit Grain.
So he ended his seclusion
and emerged from the Spirit Spring Secret Chamber.
"Grandfather, how are things?"
Shen Changchuan saw Han Qinhu waiting outside and asked him straightaway.
Shen Changchuan had certainly spoken with great confidence when he'd introduced his reforms to Dawan Village.
But it was still his first time managing the cultivation of Spirit Fields.
So he wasn't particularly confident.
"Very good."
"Going by the experience of some of the village's old farmers, the harvest should be ready in about three days."
"By their estimate, this season's yield should be good. It looks like the ten mu of Spirit Fields will produce a bit more than last season, with each mu yielding about ten more jin of Spirit Grain, for a total of one hundred and ten jin per mu."
"As for the two plots managed by Groups Eleven and Twelve, their yields should increase even more—by at least forty jin, by the rough estimate."
Dawan Village was their base of operations, after all, and the production of its twelve mu of Spirit Fields was at stake.
So several days earlier, Han Qinhu had returned from the village to prepare for the harvest. He knew more about the specific state of things than anyone.
"Changchuan, congratulations. Your reforms have succeeded."
Han Qinhu's voice was filled with emotion.
The second update won't be until after noon. I haven't been feeling quite right these past couple of days. I keep slipping back into my usual habit of padding things out as I write. I came to my senses and cut nearly a thousand words of pointless chatter from this chapter alone.
Before you continue