Half a Year

Ever since Shi Zhenghao had left that time, Yi Xuan had never seen him again. He had no idea whose daughter his senior brother had gone off to prey on this time.

Sometimes Yi Xuan wondered whether he had been right or wrong to make the Barrett and help Shi Zhenghao kill that Golden Core Evil Cultivator.

Although the man had driven Shi Zhenghao into a corner, leaving him no choice but to hide within Azure Cloud Sect territory, there was another way to look at it. Keeping him confined to Yi Xuan's side might not have been a bad thing. Otherwise, he would be out there stirring up wind and waves, and who knew how many women would fall victim to him?

Half a year passed in the blink of an eye.

For the Azure Cloud Sect, the past six months had been no different from the past ten years. The sect continued to operate by its usual rules. The only difference was that the sect master, Yi Xuan's master, was still in secluded cultivation, and the law enforcement elder had been in charge of the sect for over half a year.

During that time, no problems had arisen in the Azure Cloud Sect, which also showed that the law enforcement elder's faction was indeed capable of running a sect.

Unfortunately, he had already advanced to the Nascent Soul Realm. Although only a handful of people in the sect knew about it, sect rules dictated that Nascent Soul Cultivators automatically became grand elders.

Thus, even if Yi Xuan's master emerged from seclusion and advanced to the Nascent Soul Realm, the law enforcement elder could not become the next sect master.

The law enforcement elder himself, of course, understood this. As such, he had spent the past six months and more holding the fort for the sect, while the one actually managing it was his eldest disciple, Cui Yan.

Meanwhile, Yi Xuan and Li Jingming's business was also going full steam ahead.

Four months earlier, Yi Xuan had raised grenade production to a thousand a day.

From that day on, whenever Li Jingming saw Yi Xuan, it was as though he had seen the God of Wealth. His grin practically stretched around to the back of his head.

Li Jingming had not expected that, in just half a year, Yi Xuan would actually deliver on his original promise and enable him to earn ten thousand Low-Grade Spirit Stones a day.

But if he learned how much Yi Xuan was really making, who knew what he would think?

Yi Xuan certainly had no intention of revealing his actual profits. To keep them secret, he had not even told Liang Shi.

However, with No. 01 teaching Liang Shi, Yi Xuan did not need to say a word. Liang Shi had long since guessed that the grenade business was immensely profitable.

Speaking of which, Yi Xuan's disciple Liang Shi could not go unmentioned. The boy's aptitude for cultivation had left Yi Xuan at a loss for words. After half a year, he had only reached the Qi Refining Realm Second Layer.

Sometimes Yi Xuan wondered which of them was the Rootless Person, himself or his disciple. Taking half a year to reach the Qi Refining Realm Second Layer was as rare as a phoenix feather or a qilin horn, not just in the Azure Cloud Sect but in the entire cultivation world.

Compared to Liang Shi's situation, however, Yi Xuan's cultivation was even stranger.

Over the past six months, Yi Xuan had spent the vast majority of his time on research. All his cultivation time put together had amounted to less than ten days, yet he had somehow broken through to the Qi Refining Realm Ninety-Ninth Layer.

It had left Yi Xuan himself feeling rather suspicious. After reaching the ninety-ninth layer, he had not dared cultivate again, afraid of what might happen if he really reached the Qi Refining Realm Hundredth Layer.

As Yi Xuan saw it, there was no difference between the Qi Refining Realm Ninety-Ninth Layer and the Qi Refining Realm First Layer. He still had the same True Qi, with no sign whatsoever of it advancing into True Essence.

The increase in quantity, however, was somewhat outrageous. After advancing to the ninety-ninth layer, Yi Xuan had used his Divine Sense to investigate the black hole in his Dantian.

He found that the amount of True Qi flowing through his body was, at most, about the same as the amount of True Essence a Foundation Establishment Middle Stage cultivator possessed.

But to his Divine Sense, the True Qi inside the black hole was like a lake. Yi Xuan compared it with the amount he had possessed at the Qi Refining Twelfth Layer and found that he might now have more than ten thousand times as much True Qi.

If he converted all that True Qi into True Essence, Yi Xuan might advance straight to the Nascent Soul Realm on the spot.

Unfortunately, that would never happen.

There was some good news, though. Having reached the Qi Refining Realm Ninety-Ninth Layer meant that Yi Xuan's lifespan had increased by four hundred and ninety-five years over that of an ordinary person.

Adding that to a human's natural lifespan, Yi Xuan could now rival a Golden Core True Person in longevity. Quite a few Golden Core Realm cultivators might not even live as long as he would.

That day, Liang Shi came to Yi Xuan's house early in the morning, as he usually did. The courtyard looked the same as it had half a year ago, except that quite a few automatically rotating cameras had been added to the surrounding walls.

He entered Yi Xuan's bedroom. It was still arranged as before, but the large vase that served as the switch for the secret chamber was nowhere to be seen.

Liang Shi sat at the desk opposite the bed and pressed his thumb against a raised square on its surface.

Then a ding rang out.

"Identity confirmed. Disciple No. 1, welcome!" The spot where the entrance to the secret chamber had originally been slowly opened, and a box resembling an elevator rose from underground.

Hearing No. 01's familiar voice, Liang Shi stepped into the elevator and said, "No. 01, could you change the name used to identify me? It's just too weird!"

"No problem, but I need the boss's authorization! Besides, I gave you that name. Don't you like it?"

Unlike the highly mechanical voice it had used before, No. 01's voice was now indistinguishable from a normal human's when speaking to Liang Shi.

Liang Shi shook his head helplessly. "Master's authorization? Better forget it. Last time I accidentally broke No. 06, Master nearly skinned me alive. He's only just calmed down a fair bit these past few days, so I'd better behave myself!"

"Ding!"

The elevator doors slowly opened, revealing Yi Xuan's secret chamber to Liang Shi. But the chamber was now completely different from how it had been half a year ago.

The entire chamber looked like a factory, with three automated production lines running at high speed. Only two of the five Nüwa robots originally in the chamber remained, and they no longer needed to bustle about all over the place.

The two robots in the chamber were now only responsible for sorting and organizing the finished products from the automated lines. Many of their previous tasks had been taken over by the production lines.

No. 01's main unit, which had originally been kept in the chamber, was also nowhere to be seen.

Liang Shi crossed the chamber and came to the other side. As he approached, a screen appeared on the wall.

The camera on the screen quickly scanned Liang Shi's pupils and face. Once he passed verification, the wall beside it slowly opened, revealing another elevator.

This time, Liang Shi did not emerge so quickly after entering the elevator. He stayed inside for nearly five minutes before he felt it slow down.

When the elevator doors opened again, a space more than ten times larger than the previous chamber appeared before Liang Shi. It was a base Yi Xuan had built over the past six months, five hundred meters beneath the original chamber.

All sorts of strange machines stood in the enormous base's main hall, and countless robots moved among them, including the same kind of Nüwa robots that had been in the secret chamber.