Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit
chapter-416

The alchemy conference was held at an incredibly majestic palace called the North Ocean Palace.

On their way to the venue, Tian-Hu explained the entry test to Lu Ping.

The rules of the alchemy world were extremely strict. Aside from their skill, an alchemist had to be recognized by the authorities of the alchemy world. The conference was considered an unofficial event started by the alchemists of the ten greatest sects in the North Ocean. Although it was open to all alchemist masters in the region, it was difficult to have every master alchemist attend the event as they didn’t know each other. Hence, the entry test was like an introduction where the alchemist masters displayed their skills and earned the proper acknowledgment of the rest. No one would be hostile to the newcomers because every alchemist master had a significant network of connections that could quickly become a threat.

However, the same could not be said if a newcomer crossed paths with an enemy during the test. One hundred and fifty years ago, when Xuan-Qin became an alchemist master, Tian-Hu brought her to the conference. Upon their arrival, Xuan-Qin was stopped by Wei Xu-Ren of the Xuan Ling Sect. He tried various means to prevent her from entering, but it only ended up resulting in his own humiliation. Fifty years later, the same thing happened again, except this time, Xuan-Qin gave Wei Xu-Ren a hard time, stopping him from participating in the conference. The same thing happened several more times. During Xuan-Qin’s last appearance at the conference, Wei Xu-Ren turned around and left as soon as he caught sight of her grinning at the entrance.

As Lu Ping followed Tian-Hu right to the entrance, a voice could be heard saying, “The Zhen Ling Sect arrived with a rookie?”

“Tian-Hu, are you sure he’s an alchemist master? You know the rules can’t be broken. You’d better think carefully before you proceed.”

“Ha! This is getting interesting. Just look at Wei Xu-Ren’s expression!”

It didn’t take long until the bystanders started chiming in. However, Tian-Hu acted as if their words had nothing to do with him.

“Stop right there, you little brat!” shouted a man as soon as Lu Ping was about to enter the palace alongside Tian-Hu.

Without even pausing, Lu Ping continued his tracks. Suddenly, a flame whip pounced at him from the left side of the palace. The fire attack was useless, failing to stop Lu Ping, who was now only a couple of steps away from entering the palace.

“Peculiar fire?”

Instead of evading, Lu Ping watched as the fire attack charged at him. With a smile, Lu Ping reached out with his hand and unleashed a bright yellow flame concealed within the Seven Elemental Lightning Gourd at the incoming fire attack.

“Oh? Not bad. Now let me try as well.”

Before the man’s voice faded, another fire attack was launched at Lu Ping. This fire was also a type of peculiar fire. The fire attack bounced at Lu Ping. With each bounce, it emitted a cracking noise.

Lu Ping narrowed his eyes while a black flame charged out from the Golden House dangling on his neck.

Fortunately, he had brought Lu Qin with him. With Tian-Ling stationed at Ice Frost Island and Tian-Lin at Huang Li Island, Jiang Xuan-Xuan was on Tian Ling Mountain all alone. Lu Ping wasn’t worried about her safety, but he did fear that someone would harm Lu Qin. As a result, he sent Jiang Xuan-Xuan back to Tian-Lin’s side while he made Lu Qin’er stay by his side. Consequently, he was able to use the Black Prison Poison Fireto fend off the incoming attack.

“It’s the Black Prison Poison Fire!” shouted a cultivator in the palace. As the fires clashed, the two fires intertwined.

The Black Prison Poison Fire was quite popular, even amongst peculiar fires. It wasn’t famous for its compatibility with alchemy, but for how difficult it was to handle, its unique suitability in making poison pills, and its ability to taint the roots of other peculiar fires.

Every alchemist dreaded using an impure fire when making pills; not only would it hinder the success rate, but the impurity in the fire could also cause the pills to turn into poisonous pills.

When the Black Prison Poison Fire made its debut, the expression of the cultivator that had launched an attack became twisted. “Sh*t! I need to thoroughly check on the peculiar fire and see if it’s been tainted. Even if it’s not been tainted, I’ll probably have to stop using it for a couple of years.”

As the Black Prison Poison Fire momentarily stunned the cultivators, Lu Ping took the opportunity to continue moving forward. He was now only five steps away from entering the palace. Suddenly, another two fire attacks were sent flying toward him. He could feel the heat from the attacks even when they were still far away.

He frowned at the incoming fires. “An alchemy and a fire type mini divine ability? These guys really are holding grudges, aren’t they? You’re just jealous that I reached this level despite being much younger!”

Lu Ping was angry. With a flip of his right hand, he made a hand seal and released an alchemy fire. Unlike the other alchemy fires, this one had three colors. It was the Three Samadhi Fire.

“There are two colors in it right now, which means Qin’er has obtained two fire roots and infused them into the Three Samadhi Fire. I heard that she was rewarded for keeping Xuan-Xuan company. Could the fire roots have been her reward?” Lu Ping couldn’t help but think, “To think that keeping a little girl company can get you such nice rewards… I must say I’m jealous! A Law Avatar Realm cultivator’s reward can’t be too bad!”

Lu Ping then hurled the mini divine ability that Luan Yu had taught him at the other attack.

By this point, he was now four steps away from the entrance.

“Bah. I’ll make a move as well. To think that I’m moving against a junior… Now, this is embarrassing,” said another cultivator.

A green mist flew straight toward the fires that Lu Ping was doing his best to suppress

“It’s the Viridescent Wood Energy!” cursed Lu Ping. “Which old dog is it this time? He’s willing to spend a fortune to give me a hard time!”

The Viridescent Wood Energy was a wood-type heaven-and-earth strange item. The energy was useful for many things, but its most important function was to boost fires, propelling the fires’ strength to the next level. However, using the energy in such a foolish fight was more than just an act of waste. It was equivalent to how Luan Yu had used the mutated wood-type spirit herbs to make the fire burn stronger. It might be a heaven-and-earth strange item, but it was also a consumable. With the addition of the Viridescent Wood Energy, the fires burnt even stronger and came crashing onto Lu Ping.

The overwhelming flames left Lu Ping no choice but to consume his spirit stones. He couldn’t be bothered by the stinging pain he felt for having to spend such a fortune. With his right hand reaching towards his inter-spacial pouch, he retrieved eight spirit stones and distributed them to the four fires under his control.

After casting the Spirit Explosion Technique, Lu Ping ignited the fires and fended off the incoming attacks.

“Wow! That technique is interesting!”

“It’s more than just interesting! It’s extraordinary! Tian-Hu, since when did your sect find such an amazing technique? Are you going to trade it during the conference? I have a fire root that I have no use for; how about trading for it?”

Sitting in the palace were individuals above the level of master alchemists. When Lu Ping unveiled his technique, these individuals immediately noticed its significance. Some even attempted to trade for it, but they were all turned down by Tian-Hu. There was no way Tian-Hu, a grandmaster alchemist, didn’t know about the technique’s potential.

Lu Ping was now a step closer to the entrance. He only needed to take three more steps.

“Hmph!” a man suddenly let out a sneer. The sneer arrived like a sharp thorn, piercing Lu Ping’s mind.

Lu Ping smirked coldly. “Can’t hold back anymore, can you?”

One of the reasons why Lu Ping could cultivate his alchemy skills to such a high level with a water-type technique was because of his innately powerful divine revelation. Although he was only in the middle stage of the Core Forging Realm, he was on par with a peak Core Forging Realm cultivator in terms of divine revelation, if not stronger.

Despite having a higher cultivation level than Lu Ping, this new challenger wasn’t overwhelmingly powerful. When Lu Ping poured all of his efforts into defending, the new challenger was left empty-handed. However, he still managed to stall Lu Ping for long enough. From the North Ocean Palace came another blue flame. It effortlessly rammed right through the entangled flames and shot straight toward Lu Ping.

This blue flame was the Oceanic Blue Flame, a wonder fire of the mythic class.

“So he finally used it, huh?” Lu Ping thought.

“Oh? This young man is quite resourceful. He sure has a lot of good stuff in his possession. It seems like you’ve been focusing on this little one after the departure of Xuan-Qin, Tian-Hu. You even found him the Azure Spirit Fire. That’s a mythic class wonder fire most suitable for alchemy, unrivaled among the other wonder fires of the same class!”

Tian-Hu was undeterred by the remarks of this grandmaster alchemist. He merely smiled at him and kept quiet. In fact, Tian-Hu was surprised by Lu Ping’s possessions. After all, Lu Ping had garnered plenty of good items despite being so young.

With the Azure Spirit Fire holding off the Oceanic Blue Flame, Lu Ping finally managed to step forwards and get closer to the North Ocean Palace.