Foundations

Ye Han had long coveted the abilities of immortal cultivators. He had been cultivating for quite some time himself, and now he had achieved a little success with the Blood Refining Art. His strength and speed had increased considerably.

If nothing else, he could now bound up that cliff in a dozen or so breaths. Before, climbing it might have taken him a quarter of an hour. He felt his speed had already surpassed that of ordinary martial arts experts.

Now, a light leap carried him more than ten feet. His body was as light as a swallow, and he felt wonderful...

These were the benefits of being an immortal cultivator.

Still, he had always regretted that he had yet to successfully learn a single spell. Never mind soaring through the heavens or burrowing through the earth-he could not even cast a minor spell to turn spiritual energy into ice or gather it into fire...

So when Zhang Qingshan offered to teach him spells, Ye Han immediately perked up.

In fact, since his first contact with immortal cultivators, this was the first time Ye Han had truly had a chance to learn spells.

Although he was mature for his age, he was still a boy at heart. Naturally, he grew excited at the prospect of learning the spells of legend.

But Zhang Qingshan immediately doused him with cold water. "Let me make this clear first: until you've learned the basic hand seals and incantations, I won't teach you any spells."

Ye Han was sorely disappointed. "Huh? I still can't learn them?"

Seeing his disappointment, Zhang Qingshan smiled. "Junior Brother Ye, immortal cultivators follow a path of arduous cultivation. How could it be so easy? I cultivated for over three years before I learned a single spell. If I hadn't happened to obtain a Wood Element Spell suited to you on this trip, I wouldn't even have considered teaching you. Even if I taught it to you, your current cultivation would only let you barely cast it."

He paused, then continued, "And if you don't know the basic hand seals and incantations, learning will be even harder, because you'll need them for the spells you study from now on!"

Then he added, "Not every spell, perhaps, but most spells require incantations and hand seals. Of course, once your cultivation reaches the point where your words alone command the magic, that's another matter. But that takes at least Golden Core Stage cultivation. So laying a solid foundation will greatly benefit your future cultivation."

Ye Han hurriedly nodded. "Yes! Senior Brother Zhang, I understand. Teach me the basic Spell Formula and hand seals now!"

Zhang Qingshan immediately said, "Come! Let's sit down. I'll teach you while I meditate."

"Yes!"

Under Zhang Qingshan's guidance, he first began learning the basic incantations.

Ye Han had initially thought chanting incantations meant nothing more than pronouncing a few syllables and making sounds with his mouth...

He had never expected that it was not simply a matter of pronouncing syllables. A cultivator had to circulate his cultivation art while using the Spell Power within his body to produce sounds through his mouth. The tones had to stir Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy; only when the sounds produced that rhythmic resonance did the incantation count as successful.

If there was only sound, no matter how closely it resembled the real thing, it was useless unless it mobilized both Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy and Spell Power.

Ye Han had thought this would be fairly easy, yet after most of the day, he had learned only two syllables.

Even so, Zhang Qingshan lavished praise on him. Back when his group of outer disciples had studied this, only a handful had learned two syllables in so short a time.

Next came the basic hand seals. These involved shaping the hands into special runic gestures, likewise mobilizing Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy and working with the incantations to trace formation runes in the air...

Through countless combinations, these formation runes could mobilize Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy in various ways to create spells.

A simple flame attack was one example.

A cultivator only needed to recite the incantation that mobilized fire spiritual energy and trace the corresponding fire formation runes in the air with hand gestures. Working together, the two would transform his Spell Power into the fire element, producing flames for an attack.

To use a more vivid analogy, learning spells was like writing an essay.

An essay consisted of individual characters and words arranged into sentences. Only when they were linked into a logical, coherent sequence could they be called an essay.

Learning basic hand seals meant first learning how to write each character!

Learning basic incantations meant learning each character's pronunciation-how to read it aloud.

The spells that came afterward involved arranging these incantations and hand seals into coherent sentences, then assembling them into an essay.

In other words, spells were formed through successive combinations of these basic incantations and hand seals...

Of course, the combinations were endlessly varied. Some exceptionally powerful spells even required hundreds of hand gestures and thousands of incantations in a single casting...

Naturally, not all spells worked this way, nor was this a universal method.

The world of immortal cultivation was simply too vast. Many spells originated in ancient times or came from different regions...

Different groups, and even different races, had their own methods of chanting incantations and forming hand seals.

The basic incantations and hand seals Zhang Qingshan taught Ye Han had actually been compiled by some of the Azure Profound Sect's patriarchs to suit certain spells of the sect...

Fortunately, Ye Han showed considerable talent in both areas. For one thing, he had an excellent memory and was exceptionally bright. Although he could not perform them after Zhang Qingshan demonstrated them once, he had already committed all the key points to memory.

Naturally, Zhang Qingshan did not teach him everything at once. He proceeded step by step, gradually teaching him more after he became proficient with a few.

Ye Han's ability to learn the basic incantations and Spell Formula was impressive enough to surprise Zhang Qingshan somewhat.

In just two days, he had learned more than a dozen incantations and more than a dozen ways of forming hand seals.

Still, Zhang Qingshan did not teach him nonstop. He waited for Ye Han to become proficient before gradually passing on more!

The rest of the time, Zhang Qingshan took a type of Healing Pill and meditated to restore his cultivation...

But Ye Han could also see how strapped Zhang Qingshan was, because every time he took a Healing Pill, he broke it into two halves...

Only after a meditation session had completely absorbed the medicinal potency of the first half did he take the second.

In the Cave Abode's main hall.

Ye Han's fingers flew as he formed the Spell Formula. His movements were already quite fast, but to Zhang Qingshan, they were still far too slow. Circulating his Spell Power at such speed while constantly forming hand seals had even left his fingers a little numb...

Yet Ye Han delighted in it, because when he paid attention, he could feel his Spell Power flowing out through his fingertips and the incantations in his mouth, forming faint little vortices of Spell Power...

Just then, the door to the Cultivation Room opened, and Zhang Qingshan walked out. As he watched Ye Han form hand seals and chant incantations, he saw faint vortices of Spell Power actually forming in the air...

Surprise flashed in his eyes, and he could not help saying, "Junior Brother Ye! You can already mobilize your Spell Power? It looks like I can teach you that spell now."

Ye Han lit up with delighted surprise. "Really?"