Five days later.
Qin Ming took the invitation Manager Liao had sent over and prepared to attend the banquet.
He had just opened the courtyard gate and stepped outside when he happened to run into Huang Xishan, the chief Artifact Refiner from the opposite courtyard, who was also heading out.
"Oh! Fellow Daoist Qin, heading out?" Huang Xishan greeted Qin Ming as he walked over.
Qin Ming returned a cupped fist salute. "Indeed. Fellow Daoist Gu is holding a small celebration for her Foundation Establishment today. I was just about to head over."
"Oh? Isn't that a coincidence? I received an invitation as well. Why don't we travel there together?" Huang Xishan said with a smile.
Qin Ming looked surprised, then laughed freely. "That would be excellent!"
"By the way, Alchemist Yan and the others..." Qin Ming hesitated before asking.
Huang Xishan clearly understood what he meant and replied bluntly, "Ah, they weren't invited by Pavilion Master Gu. I heard that the cultivators invited this time have either reached the high-grade level in one of the hundred cultivation arts or are high-level cultivators."
Qin Ming understood and nodded.
Afterward.
Gu Qingzhao had not chosen Juxuan Pavilion as the venue for this small Foundation Establishment celebration.
Instead, she had arranged it at Mirror Snow Pavilion's base in the Cloud Marsh Great Wilderness—Cloud Dream Mountain.
The two left Qingyang Market, mounted their flying artifacts, and flew toward Cloud Dream Mountain.
If it had been a cultivation family, whenever a Foundation Establishment cultivator emerged from within the clan, they would have made a great fanfare of holding a "Foundation Establishment Ceremony" to display the family's strength.
Qin Ming's memory of such things was especially vivid.
Back then, on the day his family abandoned him and dispatched him to follow the Spirit Feather Sect