Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit
chapter-51

“Manager Pang, from what this junior knows, Enlightened Master Xi Xuanmu is a true disciple of our sect. His prowess should be in the Fourth Core Forging Realm and above. Although this talisman treasure is surrounded with golden lights, I can only see three spiritual halos in it. This is clearly the work of a Third Layer Core Forging Realm Enlightened Master. I am puzzled by my findings; can the senior answer my doubts?” It was Shi Lingling from Room 10.

Lu Ping quickly looked at the talisman treasure and only saw the golden lights glimmering on the surface of the talisman treasure. He couldn’t see what was inside of it. He immediately knew that Shi Lingling must have cultivated an eye-related secret technique. Otherwise, it wouldn’t make sense for her, a Blood Refining Realm disciple, to gain more insight without the divine sense belonging to Blood Condensation Realm cultivators.

On the stage, Manager Pang gave an awkward smile. “So it’s the young lady from the Shi Clan. No wonder you can see through this talisman treasure.”

“Truthfully, this talisman treasure was forged by Enlightened Master Xi during his days in the Third Layer Core Forging Realm. Right now, Enlightened Master Xi has long advanced into the Fourth Layer Core Forging Realm and has become a Zhen Ling Sect true disciple.”

This was all new information for Lu Ping. He had yet to learn of the many discipline classifications within the Zhen Ling Sect. Before this, he only learned that Master Immortal Liu, who had broken through to the Late Blood Condensation Realm, was already a core disciple. It seemed that aside from core disciples, there were also true disciples. Furthermore, the conversation between Manager Pang and Shi Lingling suggested that being in the Fourth Layer Core Forging Realm was a requirement to be a true disciple.

After gaining this new piece of knowledge, Lu Ping was now curious about Shi Lingling’s identity. Meanwhile, Manager Pang was announcing the start of the bidding.

Bidding for the talisman treasure would start at 2,000 spirit stones. Due to the high opening price, the main bidders were young masters and wealthy individuals like Lu Ping. Ordinary Blood Refining Realm cultivators wouldn’t have the funds to participate. Hence, the bidding price didn’t rise too quickly.

Lu Ping already had a talisman treasure, so he wasn’t very interested. Besides, he had already caused public outrage before this, so bidding for this talisman treasure would most likely bring a new wave of trouble.

Suddenly, Lu Ping was struck with an idea and he took out his talisman treasure. Because it was already used once, the talisman treasure’s golden lights were somewhat dimmer.

Lu Ping focused his senses on the inside of the talisman treasure and sure enough, he saw a faint spiritual halo inside of it.

He felt slightly shocked at seeing this. This talisman treasure only had one spiritual halo, meaning it was forged by a First Layer Core Forging Realm Enlightened Master. Even so, the power of the golden spear released from the talisman treasure was still incredibly strong.

He couldn’t help shaking his head. If a First Layer Core Forging Realm’s talisman treasure is already this strong, how much stronger is this Third Layer Core Forging Realm’s talisman treasure?

The bidding for the talisman treasure was coming to an end. Shi Lingling’s determination had forced the other cultivators to give up, one after another.

The current bidding price was now at 4,300 spirit stones, called by a middle-aged cultivator with a cold expression.

“4,500 spirit stones!” Shi Lingling didn’t hesitate to raise the price.

The middle-aged man turned to glance at Room 10, but he didn’t follow up with another bid. The talisman treasure was won by Shi Lingling at the price of 4,500 spirit stones.

After the auction ended, Lu Ping followed the flow of the crowd and calmly walked out of the auction house.

Sure enough, he noticed many suspicious cultivators waiting outside, quietly glancing at the departing cultivators leaving.

Fortunately, Lu Ping’s calmness didn’t attract him any attention.

Lu Ping still had many things to do. First, he went to Di Qun Island and bought a huge supply of low and mid-grade spiritual herbs from the herb stores in the market. These spiritual herbs were mostly used to concoct Blood Refining Realm medicinal pellets.

Lu Ping’s success rate of concocting Early Blood Refining Realm medicinal pellets was roughly 30%. To achieve this level of success rate, Lu Ping had spent every single low-grade spiritual herb Sheng Tao had planted in his garden 200 years ago.

Right now, Lu Ping’s plan was to raise his success rate to over 50%. After that, he would try to concoct Mid-Blood Refining Realm medicinal pellets.

Even though the spiritual herb garden had quite a number of mid-grade spiritual herbs, they would last for less than a few dozen concoctions. Lu Ping had no choice but to spend a substantial amount of spirit stones to buy more spirit herbs.

After gathering enough spiritual herbs for thirty cauldrons of low-grade medicinal pellets and twenty cauldrons of mid-grade medicinal pellets, he had already spent more than a thousand spirit stones.

When Lu Ping returned to Xuan Qi Island, he immediately received a piece of news. The young master of Xuan Ling Sect’s Qiao Clan, Qiao Xipeng, had set out to seek revenge for his fallen little brother. He led two of Qiao Clan’s Early Blood Condensation Realm disciples to the sea border between Zhen Ling Sect and Xuan Ling Sect. There, they discovered the sea snake monster that was nearby and fought it.

As a result, one of the two Qiao Clan disciples died and the other was severely wounded. The sea snake monster was severely wounded by Qiao Xipeng but it managed to escape in the end.

The incident took place in the sea territories near Huang Li Island, hence, Lu Ping was summoned by Master Immortal Liu as soon as he returned to Xuan Qi Island.

But the sea snake monster is already dead, and I’ve even made two vests out of its body. Where did this other sea snake come from?

Lu Ping pressed down the questions in his mind and arrived at Master Immortal Liu’s cultivation room.

When Master Immortal Liu saw Lu Ping, he smiled warmly and said, “Not bad, your cultivation base has greatly improved. I assumed you’d be the fourth from Group 7 to advance into the Blood Condensation Realm. But now, it looks like I’ve underestimated you.”

Lu Ping quickly cupped his hands. “This is all thanks to your guidance.”

Master Immortal Liu smiled. “Spare the formalities. I’m calling you here because of the incident on the border. You must know what happened already, correct?”

Lu Ping nodded. Master Immortal Liu continued, “Battles between cultivators are very common. However, this incident involves not just our Zhen Ling Sect’s disciples, but also Xuan Ling Sect’s disciples, and on top of that, the deep-sea monster race. Everyone is quite alarmed by this event.”

Seeing that Lu Ping was taking his words to heart, he nodded in satisfaction. “Both incidents were quite close to your Huang Li Island, hence, you need to pay special attention. I’m worried that Xuan Ling Sect’s Qiao Clan won’t let this go so easily. They might sneak into Huang Li Island’s territorial waters and search for the missing sea snake monster.”

Shocked, Lu Ping quickly asked, “Xuan Ling Sect thinks the sea snake monster escaped into our territory?”

“We can’t let our guard down. If this is really the case, our Zhen Ling Sect will definitely intervene and take action against them for invading our territory.”

He paused, then passed a charm to Lu Ping. Lu Ping recognized it as a sound-transmitting charm made by Blood Condensation Realm cultivators.

“You should patrol the nearby seas more frequently, especially the southern seas where Huang Li Island and Xuan Ling Sect intersect. Should you notice anything, tear this charm. I and the other master immortals on Xuan Qi Island will be there as soon as possible.”

…

Nothing much happened after Lu Ping returned to the peaceful Huang Li Island. He continued his normal life of caring for the seven-acres of spirit paddy fields. Because he had learned a new growth-stimulating technique, the spirit paddies would only take two months to fully grow instead of three, bumping up Lu Ping’s income even more.

Other than that, Lu Ping never failed to practice alchemy. He managed to make some progress with the support of spirit herbs.

Apart from his routine cultivation, Lu Ping also had a new task to do—patrolling the sea!

In fact, patrolling the nearby seas was one of the tasks for island disciples. It was just that the sect had never established the number of times and the protocol of the task.

However, things were different this time.