Lesser Yang Peak, a secluded cave abode.
Sunken Jade Valley was secluded, a beautiful place in the southeastern part of the Jing Kingdom.
The Jade Spring Sect had exclusive possession of the place, which was surrounded by continuous mountain ranges and presented an extraordinary sight.
After earning a sum of merit points, Chen Shuangbai decisively moved out of the inconvenient disciples' quarters.
He came to Lesser Yang Peak and rented a cave abode halfway up the mountain, where he could see the morning glow and the sea of clouds.
It was called a rental because everything inside the cave abode had already been arranged. It was quiet and understated, very much in the style of a hermit of old.
It was fully furnished and renovated, so shouldn't he rent it?
After he entered the cave abode, the Lesser Spirit Gathering Formation and Lesser Spirit Purification Formation carved into the stone walls activated automatically, keeping the whole abode clean and filled with Spiritual Qi.
Feeling the Spiritual Qi, considerably denser than outside, Chen Shuangbai thought of the rent: fifteen Spirit Stones for half a year...
Perhaps the sect was still subsidizing it by quite a bit.
After cultivating for a while, he thought it over and ultimately took out the Book of Tending Medicines.
"When I read this Book of Tending Medicines before, I always felt as though there was something in the way. Now..."
The Moon-Worshipping Clear Illumination Method cultivated pure Luminous True Qi, which was sensitive to certain hidden things.
Chen Shuangbai had always felt that the Book of Tending Medicines was not so simple.
But he had studied the Book of Tending Medicines back and forth, leafing through it no fewer than thirty times.
He had a good grasp of most of its contents, yet he still could not find anything hidden.
Not until night fell.
A bright moon hung in the sky.
The mystic, luminous moon in Chen Shuangbai's sea of consciousness drew in a beam of moonlight through the top of the cave abode, then trembled. Immediately afterward, the contents of the Book of Tending Medicines before him changed.
They did not turn into some bizarre demonic true art. Rather, from among the many characters in the book, a little over a hundred gradually brightened and arranged themselves together...
Moonlight flowed across the paper like water, and the glowing characters seemed to come alive, dancing gracefully in his sea of consciousness.
They formed a passage...
"Fair Hands Divide the Stars?"
Chen Shuangbai studied it carefully, and an understanding immediately arose in his heart.
"Not a Cultivation Method, but a Law Technique?"
Chen Shuangbai studied it carefully several more times and found that it was not just a Law Technique, but a special Law Technique created specifically to precisely separate medicinal properties during pill refinement.
After studying it seven or eight times, Chen Shuangbai committed its essentials to memory. Then he circulated his Law Power while tracing empty lines before him with both hands, following the method of applying force described in the text.
"Hmm, what a strange feeling..."
It felt like an old granny dancing, uncomfortable from head to toe.
But Chen Shuangbai refused to concede. He stopped and continued studying the hundred-character text.
Once he had gained some insight, he tried again.
At first, he found it incomparably obscure. Whenever Spiritual Power circulated through certain meridians, he even felt waves of stabbing pain.
But he was not discouraged.
Instead, he tried again and again, failed again and again, then tried again and failed again...
Over the next few days,
Chen Shuangbai felt time flow like water. The entire cave abode was silent, with only his long, steady breathing and the sun and moon taking turns to shine outside.
Until the night four days later.
Chen Shuangbai performed Fair Hands Divide the Stars completely and proficiently, only then stopping in satisfaction.
"Phew, I succeeded."
Fair Hands Divide the Stars had three stages.
Spirit Drawing, Deft Blossoms, and Star Division.
Chen Shuangbai had barely reached the Spirit Drawing stage for now.
But he suddenly felt that his hands were extraordinarily nimble, and even his thoughts... turned considerably faster than usual.
All of a sudden,
Chen Shuangbai's thoughts turned, and he began to ponder.
"Could this Fair Hands Divide the Stars be combined with my Cold Spring Guidance?"
The moment the thought arose, it swiftly took root and sprouted in Chen Shuangbai's mind, and he could no longer shake it off.
He had always been quick-witted, and now that he had a way to grow stronger, he could not help feeling even more delighted.
[Cold Spring Guidance] was the Law Technique Chen Shuangbai currently focused on. Aside from it, he had only [Obscuring Mist Method], which he used to confuse people and create illusions.
"If I really could fuse the two into one..."
A quarter of an hour later,
Chen Shuangbai grimaced as he circulated his Cultivation Method, drawing in Spiritual Qi from the Lesser Spirit Gathering Formation to slowly nourish his slightly frozen hands.
"Was I indulging in wild fantasies?"
"No, my approach must have been wrong."
Fusing two Law Techniques was truly asking a bit much of Chen Shuangbai, who was still a junior at the Qi Refining Stage.
Not only had he failed to fuse them, he had nearly injured his meridians.
Feeling the cold blockage in several acupoints in his hands, Chen Shuangbai grimaced and pondered a solution...
"There has to be a way."
The next day.
Cloud Peak Market, at the summit of Crisp Spring Peak.
As the saying went, wherever there were people, there was a jianghu.
A sect was a little jianghu.
Cloud Peak Market.
Outer sect disciples needed to exchange cultivation resources with one another, and over time, a market had formed.
He Qi had forcibly dragged Chen Shuangbai over to browse the market.
It had started because He Qi had earned quite a few merit points from the Jade Guarding Hall tasks he had taken. Seeing that the senior brothers and sisters around him all had Law Treasures, he had begun entertaining the same thought.
Chen Shuangbai had been dragged along to help appraise them.
Cloud Peak Market had a shop established by the Hundred Crafts Hall, where some of the senior brothers' and sisters' masterpieces were sold.
If one was lucky enough, perhaps one really could find a good Law Artifact.
These treasures were ranked as Law Artifacts, Spirit Artifacts, Law Treasures, Spirit Treasures, True Treasures, and Heaven-Reaching Spirit Treasures.
They were also divided into lower, middle, upper, and top grades.
As minor cultivators at the Qi Refining Stage, the Law Power they cultivated could not even be called Law Power. Spiritual Power was the more accurate term.
After entering the market, the two headed straight for the Hundred Crafts Hall's shop.
The moment He Qi saw the Law Artifacts emitting faint spiritual light, he could not take his eyes off them.
He wanted to buy this one and wanted that one too, with no sense of priorities whatsoever.
Chen Shuangbai simply went off to amuse himself.
He had no special treasure-appraising Divine Ability; it was just that... he had spotted an acquaintance.
Fu Qianlan!
Chen Shuangbai saw her haggling with the owner of a pill shop and let out a soft exclamation.
"Didn't she say the Expenditure Hall had been busy lately and she couldn't get away for the time being?"
Without a word, Chen Shuangbai slowly approached and heard the two of them talking.
"Senior Sister, how about seventy-five merit points?"
The senior sister selling the pills shook her head again.
"Junior Sister, if you really want it, eighty merit points. No more bargaining."
Fu Qianlan pondered for a moment, then heard footsteps and turned to look.
Chen Shuangbai stepped forward and asked in a low voice, "Are you short on merit points?"
Fu Qianlan looked at Chen Shuangbai's handsome features, a strange glimmer flickering in her brown eyes. But she slowly shook her head and said, "No."
She turned back to the senior sister and said, "Eighty it is. Wrap it up for me."
The senior sister immediately smiled.
"How generous, Junior Sister."