Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit
chapter-185

Enlightened Master Sun slapped his own forehead, “Oh, how could I forget!”

Then, he turned to Lu Ping and said, “Junior Brother Lu, you really can’t go. Not only are you a wanted man on Golden Jiao Island, I’m afraid the cultivators from the Heaven of Seven Stars are also looking for you, not to mention that there is also the Ocean Overturning Gang……”

Lu Ping knew the underlying meaning behind Enlightened Master Sun’s words.

His wealth had attracted too much attention. If he followed them, he would also put everyone in danger. Even with Enlightened Master Sun and Cao, they still wouldn’t be able to guarantee everyone’s safety.

Furthermore, the risks could also delay their journey which might interfere with the sect’s plan.

However, that was not the only reason why the Enlightened Masters stopped him from going. They were genuinely worried about his safety, otherwise, Enlightened Master Cao wouldn’t have given Lu Ping the white mask.

Ji Zi-Xuan was talkative and had been getting along well with Lu Ping in the Heaven of Seven Stars, so he couldn’t help but ask, “Senior Brother Lu has a different mask now, and also has a secret technique that can change his aura, surely it won’t be possible to identify him anymore, right?”

Qi Zi-Cai explained, “It’s the Golden Jiao Lord we are talking about. There will be many monster Enlightened Masters that will be there to celebrate his 600-th birthday! Junior Brother Lu’s aura-changing secret technique and the disguise mask can only hide his identity from Blood Condensation Realm cultivators, Core Forging Realm Enlightened Masters can see right through them.”

Ji Zi-Xuan immediately knew he had asked a rather dumb question, and couldn’t help but smile apologetically at Lu Ping.

Lu Ping reassured him as he knew Ji Zi-Xuan didn’t mean anything bad.

Then, Lu Ping said, “The Enlightened Masters are right. Coincidentally, I also have to return to Huang Li Island urgently. Everyone is always welcome to visit my cave-dwelling in Huang Li Island, feel free to visit me anytime when you are not busy. I wish you all a successful trip to Golden Jiao Island, and a great victory!”

The disciples admired Lu Ping for his achievements in the Heaven of Seven Stars and had good impressions of him. So, they laughed friendly and waved goodbye to him.

After bidding farewell to the crowd, Lu Ping made his way to the monster crab’s nest he used to stay at in the monster race sea.

After arriving at the nest, he released Dagui and told it to guard the entrance. He also let the snake trio out so they could play. Dabao, who was afraid of water, and Lu Qin, who was still injured, both remained in the nest.

Dabao was feeling drowsy, which happened every time it was having a cultivation breakthrough. This time, it was going from the Second Layer to the Third Layer Blood Condensation Realm.

Lu Qin stared quietly at Lu Ping as he concocted a cauldron of medicinal pellets.

The medicinal pellets he was concocting were the Bone Condensation Pellets.

Although Lu Qin was not willing to take the Humanization Pellets, she was willing to take the Bone Condensation Pellets that would allow her to speak.

Unlike the Humanization Pellet which was a half-step Core Forging Realm medicinal pellet that required 500-year spirit herbs and thousand-year spirit herbs, the Bone Condensation Pellet was only a special Late Blood Condensation Realm medicinal pellet.

Therefore, Lu Ping wanted to take this chance to practice his alchemy with the newly-obtained top-grade alchemy cauldron.

The three-legged cauldron was huge, slightly taller than his waist, and was named the River Inclusion Cauldron, to describe its enormous capacity.

The entire cauldron was dull-yellow, with a dark red burn mark on the bottom, showing that it had been used many times.

As Lu Ping began to refine the cauldron, he was shocked to find that although it wasn’t a mystic treasure yet, the Arcane Inscriptions in the cauldron were abstruse and complicated. This resulted in a huge expenditure of Lu Ping’s arcane energy and divine sense, when he refined the cauldron and left his mark of ownership.

Lu Ping finally had a clearer idea on the value of alchemy cauldrons. Compared to his unnamed pestle mystic treasure, this top-grade cauldron mystic instrument required even more arcane energy and divine sense to refine.

In other words, the cauldron was more precious than the pestle.

This shocked Lu Ping and stopped him from using the River Inclusion Cauldron to practice his alchemy. It already cost him one-third of his arcane energy just to summon it, not to mention using it for alchemy. He would probably run out of energy even before the cauldron could heat up enough to concoct anything.

No wonder Zhen Ling Sect only allowed Great Ancestors and a few top alchemists to use the sect’s three top-grade alchemy cauldrons. It wasn’t just because of the cauldrons’ value, but also because only they were strong enough to use them.

As a result, Lu Ping could only use his original mid-grade alchemy cauldron for now. Thankfully, the Azure Spirit Fire didn’t require much arcane energy to use. So, after resting for a day to recover his arcane energy, Lu Ping was ready to concoct the Bone Condensation Pellets.

In the Heaven of Seven Stars, Lu Ping’s time and energy were limited, so he only focused on harvesting thousand-year spirit herbs, rather than 500-year spirit herbs. As a result, he had a lot of thousand-year spirit herbs but few 500-year spirit herbs.

Bone Condensation Pellets were considered special medicinal pellets, so the 500-year spirit herbs used to concoct them were rare. Fortunately, the spirit herbs grown in the Heaven of Seven Stars were mostly rare spirit herbs, so Lu Ping had luckily harvested enough 500-year spirit herbs to concoct one cauldron of Bone Condensation Pellets.

When the pellets had finished concocting, he lifted the cauldron lid open, sending out a wave of medicinal fragrance from the cauldron. Seven Bone Condensation Pellets sat quietly at the bottom of the cauldron.

Lu Ping was overjoyed. It appeared that after he advanced into the Late Blood Condensation Realm, his alchemy had also improved.

Previously, his success rate for Late Blood Condensation Realm medicinal pellets was only about fifty-percent, sometimes reaching sixty-percent. But Lu Ping’s success rate was now seventy-percent.

Lu Qin only needed three to five Bone Condensation Pellets to refine the hyoid bone in her throat, and gain the ability to speak. So Lu Ping was planning on saving the leftover pellets for the snake trio. With the snake trio’s talent, they would definitely advance to the Late Blood Condensation Realm ahead of Dagui and Dabao.

Ever since Lu Qin consumed the Bone Condensation Pellets and gained the ability to speak, she had transformed from a proud Verdant Luan to a chatty little girl who endlessly looked for reasons to talk to Lu Ping all day long. At one point, she even affected Lu Ping’s cultivation routine.

One day, when Lu Ping was studying the Heart Condensation Pellet’s recipe, a little girl’s voice could be heard from outside saying, “Master, master, that man has left, that man has left!”

Lu Ping looked helplessly at the little bird that flew into the cave-dwelling and landed on his shoulder. He said, “Qin’er, didn’t I say to not call me master, why are you still calling me that?”

Lu Qin, who didn’t feel any discomfort after shrinking herself into a small little bird, said, “Dabao told me that we are master’s spirit pets, so we have to be conscious that we are master’s servants. Especially females like Qin’er, Dabao said that we cannot have any special thoughts towards master.”

Lu Ping listened speechlessly, while Dabao, who was dozing off beside him suddenly woke up after hearing Lu Qin mention its name. Then, it sped out of the cave at a speed that didn’t match its size.

Before Lu Ping could think about taking care of the culprit, Dabao had already opened another underground cave and hid quietly inside it.

Lu Ping cleared his throat and said to Lu Qin, “Don’t listen to the unreliable Dabao.”

Then, he suddenly thought of something and asked, “What do you mean by special thoughts?”

Lu Ping didn’t think much of it. He knew something didn’t feel right, but didn’t know exactly what was wrong. Eventually, he just said, “Whatever, call me however you like. By the way, Little Qin’er, who did you say had just left?”