Long Xuan's Strategy

Having obtained the Supreme-grade Spirit Insect, he immediately could not wait to return and create his own supreme-grade Gu formula. He no longer had any interest in mining.

The mines could never be exhausted, and mining wasted far too much cultivation time. He had no intention of squandering his precious time digging ore.

As for whatever Spirit Insect materials he might lack later, he could simply buy, buy, buy. There was no need to do manual labor here.

With that thought, Long Xuan's heart flew home like an arrow. He no longer wished to remain here and immediately led his four clones out.

After leaving the cave and seeing the long-missed sunlight, Long Xuan took a deep breath of fresh air. Then he ordered his four clones to seal the entrance again, striving to ensure that no one could tell there had ever been a cave here. Only then did he leave and set foot on the road home.

Half a month later, he returned to Far Western Market, covered in dust from the journey. Since he had already decided to sell the Fossil Ore Vein, he would not drag things out, lest the night grow long and dreams multiply.

Because the sum involved in this transaction was enormous, Long Xuan made multiple preparations for his own safety.

First, he had to disguise himself and wear a mask. That was essential. A proper disguise could eliminate more than half the trouble.

Second, he needed an identity that others dared not provoke. Long Xuan intended to disguise himself as an alchemist.

He was already an alchemist, so he did not even need to pretend. However, he had to inadvertently reveal that he had a powerful alchemist master behind him. Otherwise, who could a mere lowest-rank first-grade alchemist intimidate?

But even that was not enough. Long Xuan was cautious by nature, sneaky to the extreme. He actually intended to leave the entire matter to a clone.

If something truly went wrong, it would only be an insignificant clone that died. The main body could flee at the first sign of danger.

Better still, he should inadvertently let others know that this was a clone. Even if they captured him, it would be useless.

Only then could he ensure everything was foolproof.

Thus, after layering disguise upon disguise, Long Xuan, steady as an old dog, arrived at the entrance of the Qian Clan Auction House.

Like most Rogue Cultivators, he believed that the Qian Clan Merchant Association, bound by the Integrity Gu, would never bully customers by relying on its size. Therefore, whether buying or selling resources, he always prioritized shops bearing the words "Qian Clan."

By now, it had become a habit. Whenever he thought of Qian Clan merchants being restrained by the Integrity Gu, he felt completely secure.

Because there was no upper limit to the value of an ore vein, if its total value were calculated, even one percent of that value would vastly exceed what the major Lineages could bear.

Therefore, auctioning the ore vein was undoubtedly the most suitable way to handle it. Though he would still lose out, there was no helping it.

The moment Long Xuan entered the auction house, he saw a familiar fat man receiving customers. His appearance was simply too conspicuous, so Long Xuan recognized him at a glance as Qian Duoduo, whom he had encountered years ago at a Qian Clan stone-gambling shop.

Long Xuan saw him, and naturally, he saw Long Xuan as well.

When Qian Duoduo saw someone enter, wrapped up so tightly and wearing a ghost-faced mask, his eyes immediately lit up.

After years of doing business, he had long cultivated a pair of fiery golden eyes. With one glance, he could tell who possessed good goods and who was merely padding the numbers with worthless trash.

In his view, the more valuable goods someone carried, the more tightly they would wrap themselves up, concealing their features to prevent others from recognizing their identity and bringing disaster upon themselves.

This person was wrapped so tightly that not even air could pass through. Apart from his eyes, not a sliver of skin was exposed. Qian Duoduo had never seen such an outrageously furtive person in his life, so he concluded that this person must have something good on him. Otherwise, why would he be so cautious?

Thus, a smile immediately squeezed onto Qian Duoduo's round face, and he walked over with narrowed, smiling eyes.

"Sir, I am the manager here. Do you have something good that you wish to put up for auction at our Qian Clan Auction House?" Qian Duoduo asked directly.

Long Xuan nodded, took out a pill bottle, and handed it toward Qian Duoduo. In an arrogant tone, he said, "This is a Spirit-Gathering Pill. See whether it is qualified for auction!"

Naturally, he had not come here to sell pills. He merely wanted to inadvertently expose his identity as an alchemist, thereby increasing his sense of security.

Back then, he had bought a pile of discarded pills from the little medicine boy. The Spirit-Gathering Pill had been the most valuable among those discarded pills.

Using the Eye of Heavenly Secrets, he had easily deciphered most of the ingredients. For the few unclear parts, he directly ground out the incomplete formula by checking its progress, quickly completing it.

Since his Eye of Heavenly Secrets had already deciphered most of the ingredients, the incomplete formula had a very high completion rate. It took Long Xuan hardly any time at all to complete it.

The reason the Spirit-Gathering Pill was the most valuable among that pile of discarded pills was because it could help one break through a realm. A Spirit-Gathering Pill could increase the chance of breaking through to the Marrow Cleansing Stage by ten percent.

One must not underestimate that ten percent. In this region where spiritual energy was thin, one at least had a ten percent chance with a Spirit-Gathering Pill. Without one, the chance of breaking through was infinitely close to zero.

In the distant ancient age, spiritual energy had been abundant, and cultivators could break through without relying on spiritual pills.

But in this current age of thin spiritual energy, even geniuses had no choice but to rely on the power of pills to achieve breakthroughs.

It was precisely for this reason that Realm-Breaking Pills were extraordinarily expensive in this world, enough to make Gu cultivators of the same realm crack their skulls fighting over them and pay any price to obtain them.

Moreover, medicinal effects varied from person to person. The Spirit-Gathering Pill's ten percent breakthrough rate was merely an average calculated from a large population.

Gu cultivators with high aptitude had stronger absorption abilities, so their breakthrough rates would naturally exceed the average. Those with poor aptitude absorbed the medicinal power poorly, and their breakthrough rates would be even lower than ten percent.

As for someone like Long Xuan, whose meridians and spirit sea were both solid as rock, a Spirit-Gathering Pill with such weak medicinal power was practically useless to him. By then, he would likely need to create a Realm-Breaking Pill Formula with stronger medicinal effects himself.

Therefore, for talented people with purchasing power, the Spirit-Gathering Pill could raise their chances of breaking through by far more than ten percent. That was enough to make them empty their entire fortunes to buy one.

Because of all these concerns, this was Long Xuan's first time taking out a Spirit-Gathering Pill to sell.

This was not merely a first-grade spirit pill. Not only were its costs high, but it was also extremely difficult to refine. Even if a second-grade alchemist lowered himself to refine this first-grade spirit pill, a success rate of one in thirty would already be decent. It was nearly impossible for a first-grade alchemist to refine a Spirit-Gathering Pill.

Given the difficulty of refining Spirit-Gathering Pills, they simply could not be mass-produced. Their extreme rarity also made them difficult to find on the market. Once one appeared, it would certainly be frantically fought over. It was entirely normal for its final price to surpass that of a second-grade spirit pill.

Long Xuan had not brought out the Spirit-Gathering Pill today to make money.

Rather, he wanted to use the difficulty of refining the Spirit-Gathering Pill to tell others that it could not possibly have been refined by a Spirit Gathering Stage Gu cultivator like him. It had to have come from the hands of the master behind him. Anyone thinking of making a move had best weigh the consequences carefully.