Practicing Sorcery and Refining Talismans

This book was already an incomplete copy; after the sword technique, only a few pages remained, recording two techniques.

One was called Blood Light Shield, and the other was Bloodlight Escape.

But the Bloodlight Escape was too incomplete, with only a few sparse words, utterly insufficient for cultivation.

The Blood Light Shield, however, was recorded in great detail—it was precisely the technique Meng Tianyi had used to block his talisman sneak attack.

After reading it, Su Shi'er firmly committed the contents to memory.

He couldn't meet the basic cultivation requirements for the sword technique, so practicing it was impossible. But the Blood Light Shield was quite suitable for him.

After tallying up the gains from this time, Su Shi'er continued his arduous training.

This time, he didn't focus on raising his cultivation level but instead concentrated on practicing techniques.

Counting the technique book he'd bought from the trading square, he now had four techniques to practice.

Blood Light Shield, Rain Calling Technique, Object Manipulation Technique, Heavenly Eye Technique.

In truth, among these four techniques, aside from the Blood Light Shield, the other three were only average in combat effectiveness.

The Rain Calling Technique merely conjured a light drizzle, typically used by ordinary menial disciples to tend Spirit Fields.

The Object Manipulation Technique used true essence to move items; depending on the item's weight and material, the true essence consumption varied. This technique had no strong offensive power and was mainly used for picking things up.

As for the Heavenly Eye Technique, it allowed one to observe the flow of Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi and had the effect of seeing through invisibility and qi concealment.

The latter three techniques were clearly more functional. Few people would waste time cultivating such techniques.

Su Shi'er, however, had his own ideas. For one, he felt the Heavenly Eye Technique could be useful in the trial.

He took all techniques seriously, not necessarily mastering them to perfection, but training them to a high degree of proficiency.

Two months later, less than four months remained until the Newcomer Trial.

Feeling that his techniques were unlikely to improve much further, Su Shi'er took out the two incomplete talisman introductory books he'd bought and began studying them.

Talismans were a wondrous existence, sealing techniques onto a small piece of paper, allowing instant activation with very little true essence—extremely convenient.

For Su Shi'er, his low cultivation and insufficient true essence were always a problem. If he had enough talismans, he'd have more ways to protect himself.

But talismans were consumables. Though he could afford them, he dared not spend recklessly anymore.

Two months ago, just for a single Level 1 Top-grade Defense Talisman, he'd been cheated and nearly brought deadly trouble upon himself.

This experience made Su Shi'er even more determined to learn talisman crafting and master the skill himself.

Talisman crafting mainly had two methods. One used cinnabar and talisman paper as materials. The other used beast blood and beast hide. But regardless of the method, an indispensable item was needed: the Talisman Brush.

The Talisman Brush was a crucial medium connecting the cultivator and the materials. A good brush could greatly increase the success rate of talisman crafting.

Fortunately, the book had detailed instructions on making a Talisman Brush, and crafting first-level talismans only required an ordinary one.

Over the past four-plus years, Su Shi'er had hunted countless demon beasts. Now, to practice talismans, beast hide and beast blood naturally became his practice materials.

In the days that followed, Su Shi'er threw himself entirely into talisman practice and crafting.

In four months, Su Shi'er wore out a full twenty Talisman Brushes and ruined who knows how many materials.

From constant failures at the start to occasionally succeeding on one or two by the end.

The success rate wasn't high, but his hard work paid off, and he managed to stockpile a fair number of usable talismans of various types.

One day, early morning.

"Clang, clang, clang..."

Early in the day, a bell resounded through the sect, shaking the skies.

The bell's sound was vast and deafening, stirring the entire Yun Ge Sect into a lively bustle.

Hearing the commotion, Su Shi'er rolled out of bed in one swift motion and sprinted toward Luofu Peak.

At the top of Luofu Peak, there was a plaza before a majestic hall.

The plaza was packed with nearly a hundred people. All of them were menial disciples with cultivation below Qi Refining Stage Six.

The age range was astonishing—young ones like him, sixteen or seventeen; older ones included those with wrinkled faces and hunched backs, sixty or seventy years old.

"Tsk... the sect is really going all out to explore this ancient forbidden zone, huh?!"

"But I never expected Luofu Peak, where you hardly see a soul on normal days, to have so many menial disciples!"

Arriving at the peak and seeing this scene, Su Shi'er actually felt relieved.

In just five years, with his Mixed Spiritual Roots talent, he'd cultivated to Qi Refining Stage Four. He'd been worried the Peak Master might notice him and find it hard to explain, but with so many people, the chance of the Peak Master singling him out was extremely low.

Taking a deep breath, he quickly mixed into the crowd, found an inconspicuous spot, tucked his head in, suppressed his aura as much as possible, and activated the Heavenly Eye Technique to silently observe the others.

In his view, among the older disciples, a large number had concealed their auras to the greatest extent.

Among the younger disciples, only a few had deliberately suppressed their auras.

"Twelfth Senior Disciple Brother, I finally found you!" Just then, a voice called out.

Su Shi'er was startled and quickly turned to look.

He saw a medium-built fatty walking up to him with a beaming smile. The newcomer was none other than the much-grown little fatty, Zhu Hanwei.

"You're looking for me... for something?" Su Shi'er frowned slightly, his gaze sweeping over him in a flash. At this moment, Zhu Hanwei was already a Qi Refiner at the second layer of the Qi Refining Stage, which caught him a little off guard.

It seemed that after taking the Foundation Cultivation Pill, he had awakened his spiritual root.

Zhu Hanwei nodded with a smile, his eyes darting around as he quickly surveyed the surroundings, then spoke in a low voice: "This Newcomer Trial actually has so many miscellaneous disciples participating too."

"We've only been in the sect for five years—whether in cultivation or strength, we can't compare to them at all!"

"I don't know what's going on, but I always feel that this Newcomer Trial will be quite dangerous. I think we need to band together, so if anything really comes up, we can handle it."

Su Shi'er remained expressionless at these words, but inwardly he couldn't help thinking more highly of this little fatty. He had obtained fairly complete information about this Newcomer Trial from that Meng Tianyi.

Yet this little fatty, just from the addition of miscellaneous disciples, had sensed danger. That intuition could be called quite sharp.

As for why he had sought him out, that wasn't hard to guess. With Zhu Hanwei's cultivation level, it was nearly impossible for him to win over those miscellaneous disciples who had joined earlier.

As a fellow disciple who had entered at the same time and also had poor spiritual root aptitude, he was undoubtedly the best choice.

Seeing Su Shi'er remain silent, Zhu Hanwei grew a bit anxious. After thinking it over, he quickly smiled and said:

"Martial Brother, if you're worried that just the two of us won't be enough hands, then don't be!"

"This time, I've also called Chen Tie and Li Jingjing."

With that, he grinned and waved toward the distance.

Only then did Su Shi'er notice three figures standing not far away. Two of them were the other two who had joined the sect with him four years ago.

These three stood together, and in response to Zhu Hanwei's greeting, they didn't pay it much mind, their eyes slightly raised, their expressions rather haughty.

As for their cultivation levels, one was at the third layer of the Qi Refining Stage, and two were at the second layer—not too bad for newcomers.