Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit
chapter-210

His confidence came from the Continuous Leaf Mystical Lavenders.

They were the thousand-year spirit herbs that Lu Ping had bought from Li Er-Qiang using a Blood Condensing Pellet.

Lu Ping had found three ways to strengthen his divine sense.

The first way was the [Divine Furtherance Technique] which he had always been cultivating. The third method was the [Divine Separation Technique] which he had also been cultivating using the Soul Nurturing Wood.

The second way was the [Divine Expansion Technique], which he couldn't cultivate as it required the aid of a special type of medicinal pellet, known as the Divine Expansion Pellet.

However, the [Divine Expansion Technique] was actually easy to cultivate and the Divine Expansion Pellets were also easy to concoct. The issue was the scarcity of the Continuous Leaf Mystical Lavenders that were needed to concoct the pellets. In fact, this thousand-year spirit herb was actually almost as rare as 3000-year spirit herbs.

After Lu Ping officially became an Alchemist, he had been looking for them ever since. He had even asked his teacher, Enlightened Master Liu Xuan-Ling, and second senior sister, Enlightened Master Li Xuan-Ru if they had any in their possession, but they also had none.

He had almost given up, and certainly didn’t expect to find them here in the East Ocean.

With the Continuous Leaf Mystical Lavenders, Lu Ping would be able to concoct the Divine Expansion Pellets, which were half-step Core Forging Realm pellets. Divine Expansion Pellets only required 15 thousand-year spirit herbs, so they were harder to concoct compared to Golden Nut Pellets, but much easier than Heart Condensation Pellets.

Lu Ping had already prepared the rest of the spirit herbs a long time ago, and had only been lacking the final ingredient.

Back when he concocted the Golden Nut Pellets, Lu Ping had modified the purification technique increasing the success rate to 40%. So, the success rate should be lower for the Divine Expansion Pellets as they were harder to concoct.

But because of his advancement to the Eighth Layer Blood Condensation Realm, Lu Ping's divine sense had improved greatly, helping him to raise the success rate back to 40%.

So, three Continuous Leaf Mystical Lavenders and three cauldrons of spirit herbs, coupled with a 40% success rate, resulted in a total of 12 Divine Expansion Pellets.

After concocting the pellets, Lu Ping was running low on thousand-year spirit herbs again.

Perhaps because of the Continuous Leaf Mystical Lavenders, the Divine Expansion Pellets were also dark black in color and looked like small black holes.

In fact, when Lu Ping wrapped his divine sense around one of the pellets, the pellet absorbed his divine sense like mad just like a mini black hole!

However, as he continued to inject his divine sense into the pellet, it also started to shrink like a melting snowball. Through his divine sense, Lu Ping could tell that the pellet was undergoing a marvelous transformation.

As the pellet became highly concentrated with his divine sense, it started to change color from dark-black to transparent, like a black hole transitioning into a ball of energy.

Eventually, the pellet actually became a ball of divine sense. Suddenly, the pellet exploded and merged with his divine sense. Lu Ping immediately felt that his divine sense had improved, he could now sense things an extra hundred feet further away compared to before.

Lu Ping carefully inspected the increase in his divine sense. The entire process took around four hours, but the improvement wasn’t bad.

However, Lu Ping knew this would only happen once, since the efficacy of the following pellets would gradually decrease.

Sure enough, the second Divine Expansion Pellet only increased his divine sense by another eighty feet.

…

Half a month after Lu Ping had received the Li Clan's invitation to the underground trade fair, he had already consumed all twelve Divine Expansion Pellets. His divine sense had expanded by about 300 feet. Lu Ping could now sense an area of 2000 feet around him.

Lu Ping summoned Little Sima and listened to the recent happenings in the city, while shopping for spirit herbs.

The strongest Zhang Clan remained the same, while the Li Clan was less active recently, with their clan members behaving cautiously whenever they went out.

On the contrary, the Wang Clan was much more active than usual, organizing meetings and inviting many guests, including the notable rogue cultivators and smaller forces in the city. It was also rumored that the clan head had visited the Li Clan several times. The Wang Clan cultivators had also been seen touring outside with cultivators in silver uniforms around the city.

As Lu Ping listened carefully, the duo had already come to the mortal marketplace, and were distracted by a loud ruckus.

Lu Ping looked over and saw a cultivator in a silver uniform accompanied by a young man and a middle-aged man. They seemed to be having an argument with a rogue cultivator who had set up a stall in the market.

When Lu Ping saw the cultivator in silver uniform, he already thought of avoiding contact, but the crowd had already noticed Lu Ping and shouted, "Senior Lu is here, Senior Lu!"

Everyone looked towards Lu Ping and the argument also stopped. Seeing that he couldn't walk away, he brought Little Sima and walked towards the market in a casual manner.

As he entered the marketplace, Li Er-Qiang, who had successfully entered the Blood Condensation Realm, came out of nowhere and handed two jade boxes to Lu Ping, and said, "Senior Lu, what do you think of these spirit herbs?"

Lu Ping opened them and looked inside. He suddenly heard Little Sima murmuring softly behind him, "Seven pieces of 500-year Harboring Jade Grasses and five pieces of Snowy Night Grasses."

Lu Ping turned his head to look at Little Sima, and asked, "You know these spirit herbs?"

Little Sima blushed embarrassingly and answered anxiously, "I've learned a lot from senior during this period, so I can recognize them."

Little Sima was anxious, but Lu Ping didn't say anything else and turned to ask Li Er-Qiang, "You've just entered the Blood Condensation Realm, so you should take some time to consolidate your cultivation base instead of going to the Endless Sea again."

Li Er-Qiang smiled and didn't answer.

Lu Ping knew that Li Er-Qiang was doing it for the two children left behind by his big brother. He had heard that the children were actually quite talented, so Li Er-Qiang was trying to provide them with the necessary cultivation resources.

Then, Lu Ping said, "The Harboring Jade Grasses are needed for Late Blood Condensation Realm pellets. They are exactly what I need right now. As for the Snowy Night Grasses, although they are not main ingredients, they are still used in many Blood Condensation Realm pellets. So, they are worth quite a lot too. Here, I will exchange them with this. Use it to consolidate your cultivation base. As long as you stabilize your cultivation base, you will be able to look after those kids better."

Li Er-Qiang clutched the item in his hands tightly. Although he was excited, he didn't show it and simply bowed at Lu Ping, before leaving in a hurry.

After Li Er-Qiang returned to his house, he opened his hands and saw an exquisite interspatial pouch. Inside the interspatial pouch, was a bottle of Fu Ling Pellets for Early Blood Condensation Realm cultivators, and two mid-grade spirit stones.

Wang Yi-Shan was furious.

Recently, there was an honored guest that had come to the Wang Clan. Wang Yi-Shan had expended a huge effort to invite this honored guest to tour around the city, and had even asked a clan alchemist to accompany them.

The honored guest was also an expert alchemist who could concoct half-step Core Forging Realm pellets. Alchemists at this level were just a step away from becoming Master Alchemists, and so were usually known as Quasi-master Alchemists.

Wang Yi-Shan was hoping that he could win the favor of this honored guest, so that the honored guest would concoct some medicinal pellets to help him breakthrough to the Core Forging Realm. By then, Wang Yi-Shan would be the fourth Core Forging Realm Enlightened Master in the Wang Clan, and would definitely inherit the Wang Clan.

He would also become the strongest amongst the younger generation in the three clans. Li Clan's prideful Li Xiu-Zhu, and Zhang Clan's brother and sister, Zhang Sheng-Qian and Zhang Sheng-Kun, would be no match for him anymore!

Wang Yi-Shan had been praising himself for his quick-wits. But unexpectedly, the honored guest was interested in shopping in the mortal marketplace instead.

Wang Yi-Shan had no idea why a noble alchemist would be interested in going to the lowly places where rogue cultivators and mortals gathered. Although Three Clans City wasn’t a big city, the facilities were still decent, so there were many other places to go to compared to the mortal marketplace.

Whilst Wang Yi-Shan didn't know why, he couldn't refuse the request either, and thought that this was perhaps the honored guest's hobby.

But Wang Yi-Shan had never been to the mortal marketplace before, and so was shocked by how abominable these dodgy stall owners were. They all pretended to know a lot about the items they sold, and shamelessly raised the prices every time. Did they really think they were more knowledgeable than the two alchemists with him?

Seeing that they had negotiated the price several times and still couldn't seal the deal, Wang Yi-Shan's already limited patience grew short.

On the other hand, although the honored guest was also not feeling good, he was still patiently bargaining with the stall owners.

So, Wang Yi-Shan, who had always looked down on the rogue cultivators, thought that his chance had come.

He would show these ungrateful rogue cultivators who really owned the Three Clans City. He wanted to see who would dare stand against him, the noble young master of the Wang Clan!

Wang Yi-Shan could already foresee these ungrateful rogue cultivators presenting their items to him on a silver platter.

This way, not only could he demonstrate the Wang Clan's might and status, he could also do a favor to the honored guest and leave a good impression.

Wang Yi-Shan was very proud of himself for coming up with such a clever plan.

But life was always unpredictable.

Just after Wang Yi-Shan showed off his identity and his clan's name to suppress an old man to sell him the spirit herbs, the rogue cultivators in the marketplace suddenly came together and condemned the Wang Clan for trying to buy the spirit herbs at a much lower market price.

Young Master Wang Yi-Shan's initial intention of showcasing his dominance had not only failed, but it had even brought him the anger of the rogue cultivators.

He was infuriated and thought, How dare they! Since when did they have such deep knowledge of spirit herbs?

So, it eventually turned into a heated argument between the young master and the rogue cultivators. The Wang Clan alchemist that followed him here tried to stop the argument, but it was already too late.