chsdbacks Chapter 15 Silver Armor
Chapter 15 Silver Armor
The chance of successfully establishing one's foundation is only 30% to 40%. This is an ironclad rule in the cultivation world, a fact proven by countless cultivators with their lives. One Foundation Establishment Pill offers only a 30% to 40% chance. Two pills bring the chance to 50% to 60%. Three pills can exceed 70%! Only with a chance of over 70% is it worthwhile for him to give his all to fight this hurdle!
One is far from enough.
He still needs at least two more.
The sect would bestow another one? Absolutely not. As a nominal disciple, obtaining one in the once-every-five-years grand competition was already his limit. To achieve merit? In the years he'd been in the Spirit Beast Mountain, the sect's tasks were few and far between, mostly menial tasks like patrolling, gathering herbs, and feeding beasts. Even the smallest merit, accumulated over ten years, wouldn't be enough to exchange for a single Foundation Establishment Pill.
The only hope remains in the Crimson Forbidden Land!
He had already thoroughly investigated the rules regarding exchanging spiritual herbs for Foundation Establishment Pills within the forbidden area before and after the competition. The Crimson Forbidden Area, jointly opened by the seven sects of Yue Kingdom, was one of the most important ways for Qi Refining disciples to obtain Foundation Establishment Pills. It contained a large number of rare spiritual herbs, and those of sufficient grade and age could be exchanged for Foundation Establishment Pills from their respective sects.
The exchange process has also been established:
One designated spiritual herb can be exchanged for one Foundation Establishment Pill! Designated herbs include: Profound Soul Grass over 300 years old, Blood Jade Lingzhi over 500 years old, Purple Sun Flower over 400 years old, and several other rare spiritual herbs he had never heard of before. Other spiritual herbs can also be converted into merit points; accumulated enough can also be exchanged, but the required quantity far exceeds that of the designated herbs!
He already had a task involving the Mystic Soul Grass, which was requested by True Immortal Chiyun. If he could find the Mystic Soul Grass in the forbidden area and deliver it, True Immortal Chiyun would fulfill his promise and reward him. Although True Immortal Chiyun did not specify what the reward would be, given his Core Formation level status, bestowing a Foundation Establishment Pill should not be difficult.
If you exchange one more of these medicines, you'll have two. Putting the one in your hand together, you'll have three!
With three Foundation Establishment Pills, the success rate of breaking through to the Foundation Establishment stage should be over 70%!
This goal is not unattainable.
Chen Fan put the pill bottle back into the depths of his storage bag and then took out a list. This list was compiled by him over the past few days, listing the known types of spiritual herbs in the Crimson Forbidden Land, their required age, exchange value, and the names of spiritual herbs designated by the sect as "one herb for one pill." The handwriting was meticulous, with many corrections and additions.
He read it again, word by word, line by line, repeatedly verifying in his mind the characteristics, growing places, and harvesting methods of each medicinal herb. The information came from various sources, such as the scriptures in the sect's library, oral accounts from old rogue cultivators in the market, or conversations with fellow disciples. The sources were diverse and their accuracy was hard to guarantee, but anything was better than nothing.
After finishing, he put away the list. Ironclad crawled out of the spirit beast pouch and lay down beside the futon, its whiskers swaying gently. The teeth marks left from its battle with the Azure-Eyed Sable during the competition had scabbed over, and the scratches on its carapace had faded considerably. The Golden-Backed Demon Mantis's self-healing power was among the best of all spirit insects; it should be fully recovered in another three to five days.
Chen Fan extended his finger and lightly touched the bronze backplate of the armor. The armor's whiskers stood up, swayed left and right a few times, and then returned to stillness.
The Crimson Forbidden Land is about to open. Before that, he needs to study the third level of the "Great Evolution Prison Suppression Scripture," the "Prison Suppression" technique, several more times, adjust his armor to its peak state, and properly inventory and organize his talismans and magical artifacts. Within the forbidden land, every bit of strength is a matter of life and death. The more prepared he is, the more chances he has of survival.
The stone chamber fell silent once more. The mountain wind howled outside the window, and a few occasional beast cries echoed from the direction of the main peak of the Spirit Beast Mountain in the distance. Chen Fan sat cross-legged on the futon, his breathing long and steady, his consciousness slowly circulating in his sea of consciousness, deducing the profound mysteries of the "Prison Suppression Wall" over and over again.
The armor lay still at his feet, like a silent, dark gold stone.
Half a year has passed in the blink of an eye.
Chen Fan sat cross-legged on a futon in his cave, his hands forming hand seals, his breathing long and even. Within his dantian, the vortex of magical power had completely solidified, no longer the loose mist it had been a year ago, but transformed into a vortex as dense as mercury. Each strand of his magical power circulated throughout his body, more than thirty percent thicker than when he was at the twelfth level of Qi Refining!
Qi Refining Stage Thirteen, Great Perfection!
He slowly opened his eyes, his consciousness sinking into his sea of consciousness. In the center of his sea of consciousness, a ring-shaped barrier, solid as a solid object, stood silently, its surface covered with intricate, ever-flowing patterns. This was the sign of the successful completion of the third level of the "Great Evolution Prison Suppression Scripture," the Prison Suppression Wall! Within the wall, a faint halo of light flowed, the pure spiritual power of his consciousness, constantly being worn down and refined by the inner demons suppressed beneath it.
The first three levels of mental cultivation have now been fully perfected!
With a slight thought, the Prison Suppression Wall trembled gently, and a surge of divine power flowed out, circulating through the body's surface along a specific path. On the back of his bare hand, a very faint silver-gray halo appeared, as thin as a cicada's wing, almost transparent, yet it remained condensed and did not dissipate, clinging tightly to the skin to form a barely perceptible light film.
Silver Armor!
This is a supernatural power that awakens spontaneously after the first three levels of the "Great Evolution Prison Suppression Scripture" are completed. There is no need for deliberate practice. When the three levels of "Concentrating the Spirit," "Transforming Thoughts," and "Suppressing Prison" are accomplished, this supernatural power will naturally become part of the practice itself and be imprinted on the sea of consciousness.
He repeatedly tested the armor's power. A direct slash with the Golden Flame Blade at seventy percent of its power only caused slight ripples in the silver armor before it returned to normal. A full-force strike with the Ironclad Scythe only left fleeting, shallow marks on the light membrane. According to his estimation, the armor's defensive strength far surpassed the Golden Mirror he had purchased for five hundred spirit stones, and was comparable to a top-tier defensive magic weapon!
More importantly, this armor requires no additional activation! As long as one's magical power and divine consciousness remain, the silver armor will automatically provide protection. In the instant of attack, one's divine consciousness will instinctively draw upon the power of the Prison-Suppressing Wall to infuse the armor, resulting in a reaction speed far surpassing any magical artifact!
Another wondrous use of the Prison-Suppressing Wall is to suppress inner demons and transform them into power, which has also allowed his spiritual sense to steadily increase over the past six months. Now, the range of his spiritual sense is nearly a hundred feet! This distance far exceeds the limits of most Qi Refining cultivators, firmly placing him at the threshold of the early Foundation Establishment stage! The spiritual sense of ordinary Qi Refining cultivators at the Great Perfection stage is only fifty or sixty feet; his spiritual sense is almost twice as strong as that of cultivators at the same level!
As his spiritual awareness grew, the vortex in his palm also underwent further changes. The vortex pattern had expanded to the size of an infant's fist, occupying most of his left palm, and the number of concentric circles had increased from five to six. The time required to refine a single Qi Refining Pill had shrunk from more than half a cup of tea to less than half a cup of tea, and refining twenty pills a day was effortless. Under extreme conditions, he could barely manage to refine twenty-four or twenty-five pills.
In just six months, the Qi Refining Pills he had refined filled all the jade bottles on the wooden shelves of his cave dwelling. After deducting the pills he used for himself and those used for the armor, the number of spirit stones in his storage bag had jumped from three digits to four digits!
A month before the forbidden area opened, he spent all the spirit stones he had accumulated over the past six months.
Fangshi, Bailiantang.
This shop was the largest magical artifact shop in the outer market of Spirit Beast Mountain, occupying a prime location in the heart of the street. It had two floors and a spacious three-bay facade. As Chen Fan entered, the shopkeeper behind the counter looked up and glanced at him. The shopkeeper's surname was Zhou, and he was over fifty years old, with a cultivation level in the early Foundation Establishment stage. It was rumored that he was a relative of an elder of Spirit Beast Mountain and had been dealing in magical artifacts in the market for decades, possessing a sharp eye for them.
Without exchanging pleasantries, Chen Fan went straight to what he wanted: a top-grade offensive magic weapon!
Shopkeeper Zhou sized him up but asked no further questions. He turned and took a long, narrow brocade box from the display case, placed it on the counter, and opened it. Inside lay a knife, eighteen feet long, with a straight blade, a single, sharp edge, and a cold, dark golden sheen at the edge. A blood groove ran along the spine of the blade, with a row of fine flame patterns engraved on each side of the groove. The hilt was made of dark spirit wood, wrapped with fine dragon tendons, and the end was inlaid with a red crystal the size of a grain of rice.