SEC Chapter 14 Settling
Chapter 14 Settling
A black figure sped through the air, flying over forests, rivers, and grasslands until it saw a collapsed thatched hut. The figure then stopped; it was Zhang Yunling.
Looking at the dilapidated thatched hut before him, he felt an overwhelming sense of guilt. With tears welling in his eyes, he rushed forward and used his bare hands to dig through the dry grass and mud, trying to find his father's body.
But after searching the entire thatched hut, all they found was a skeleton and a jade pendant clutched tightly in its hand.
This jade pendant was a talisman that Zhang He, the godfather, obtained from a fortune teller before his death. Zhang He always wanted Zhang Yunling to wear it, but he always refused because he looked down on these charlatans.
A muffled rumble of thunder echoed in the sky, as if moved by the tragedy of the father and son, followed by the sound of raindrops falling.
Sixteen years have passed, and Zhang Yunling was in tears, kneeling on the ground and kowtowing repeatedly until his forehead was covered in blood and blood flowed down his face before he stopped.
"Your son is unfilial, unable to care for you in your old age or let you die peacefully... Such a heinous hatred, your son will definitely use everything to avenge it, and use his whole life to avenge it!" Zhang Yunling gritted his teeth and spoke his vow with red eyes.
He gently took the jade pendant from his father's hand and held it tightly. Then he buried the remains in a thick burial mound, erected a tombstone, knelt for a long time, and kowtowed repeatedly. As the torrential rain poured down harder and harder, the rain mixed with blood and tears on his face fueled the fire of revenge in his heart.
Three days later, Zhang Yunling had calmed down. Around his neck hung the talisman his father had obtained for him years ago, and at his waist hung the storage bag given to him by Granny Wang. In front of him was a worn-out medicine cauldron he had found in the storage bag. Although it looked inferior to the cauldron he had used at the Black Cliff Sect, the thought that it belonged to Granny Wang filled him with respect. He stopped thinking about the quality of the cauldron and began to seriously study the method of refining the Foundation Establishment Pill.
He had already reached the tenth level of Qi Refining when he was twelve years old. Now, after four years of accumulation, he has taken three Qi Condensation Pills every day and practiced meditation for six hours a day. The spiritual power in his dantian is extremely condensed, and he can be said to be ready to break through at any time.
In his memory, Granny Wang taught him: "There are four types of Foundation Building: Broken Plate, Flawed, Flawless, and Perfect. Among them, Broken Plate Foundation Building has the lowest upper limit, and it can generally only stop at the Great Perfection of the Golden Core stage."
A flawed Foundation Establishment is slightly better, allowing one to cultivate to the Nascent Soul stage, while a flawless Foundation Establishment is sufficient to cultivate to the Dao Inquiry stage, which is already quite good.
"However, seeking the Dao is only the limit for mortal cultivators. These cultivators can only seek their own Dao, but cannot embark on this path. In the end, they are just ordinary mortals, and they have no chance to walk the path to immortality in this life."
However, if you can achieve the perfect Foundation Establishment, a feat attained by only one in a million, you will have laid a solid foundation for future ascension. If you encounter a great opportunity later, you will have the chance to embark on your own path, ascending from these five realms to the Nine Heavens and becoming a true immortal!
"Even foundation building requires foundation building pills to get through it. The way to refine a perfect foundation building pill is to replace the missing part of your five elements spiritual roots with natural treasures of the same attribute. The higher the quality, the better the effect."
The next step is to refine each of these rare and precious herbs into a single pill, with effects similar to the Qi Condensation Pill. Finally, these pills are added to the Xuanlong Ginseng and refined together to form the Perfect Foundation Establishment Pill. Consuming this pill will allow one to establish a perfect foundation for their Dao.
"I see," Zhang Yunling smiled slightly. "Actually, it's not difficult. The place with the most and most concentrated medicinal herbs is undoubtedly the Monster Forest." Stepping through the air, Zhang Yunling arrived above the Monster Forest. Looking at the collapsed ground, a sense of melancholy welled up in his heart.
Without looking back, Zhang Yunling landed on the ground, chanted the incantation in his mind, and activated the Divine Speed Ghost Step that he had not used for sixteen years.
Searching on the ground should be easier, and given Zhang Yunling's proficiency in his technique, he wouldn't need to fight any monsters he encounters; he could simply go around them.
He sensed the various spiritual roots within his body. He possessed three of the five elements, but lacked the metal and water elements. It seemed that he needed two kinds of rare and precious materials with the metal and water attributes, respectively. Zhang Yunling immediately circulated his cultivation, spread his divine sense to cover a hundred-meter radius around him, and moved quickly using the Swift Ghost Step technique.
He believed that with his knowledge of plants, even searching in this rough way wouldn't lead to any oversights. Sure enough, after searching for three days and three nights, Zhang Yunling finally broke out of the Monster Forest the next morning and stopped by a stream.
"Huff...huff...this should be good enough." Zhang Yunling panted heavily as he took out five or six items from his storage bag, including high-purity gold ore and the high-grade water-attribute herb, the Earth Dragon Vine, all of which he had found in the Monster Forest. He even dug up several pieces of the extremely rich spiritual energy Golden Scale Crystal that grew near the lair of the sixth-tier monster deep in the forest.
Without saying a word, Zhang Yunling immediately sat down on the ground and began to breathe deeply to recover his depleted energy. After a long while, feeling that his cultivation and spiritual sense had returned to their peak state, Zhang Yunling flew back to the location of the pill cauldron that Wang Po had given him.
The cauldron is dark red in color, tall and majestic, but due to its age, it has many signs of wear and tear. Even so, the cauldron is still filled with an ancient and mysterious aura of alchemy.
Zhang Yunling stretched his legs and then grabbed several items beside him, throwing them all into the cauldron at the same time to refine them!
He couldn't tell which rare and precious materials were better, but if he only chose one of each, he couldn't guarantee the success rate of the Foundation Establishment Pill. So, he decided to refine them all into pills and pile them all in!
Driven by spiritual power, the pill fire was ignited, and several rare and precious materials were melted by Zhang Yunling's control of the flames. Metal elements merged with metal elements, and water elements merged with water elements. Although they were both in the cauldron, Zhang Yunling used his spiritual power to separate them and condense them separately.
A moment later, seeing that the two energies inside the cauldron had condensed to a great extent, Zhang Yunling patted his storage bag, and several medicinal herbs flew out, each of high quality, splitting into two streams that merged with the two energies, one golden and one blue.
Several more hours passed. Zhang Yunling calmed his mind and focused his attention on the two already perfectly formed energies. He added a burst of fire to complete the final pills for the two Foundation Establishment Pills that replenished the metal and water spiritual roots.
It was already late at night. As the alchemical fire died down, two pills shot out from the cauldron. Zhang Yun took a swift step, leaped into the air, grabbed the two Foundation Establishment Pills that were shining brightly in the night sky, and laughed loudly.
"Hahahaha! This path of alchemy is nothing but a joke in front of me!"
After landing, Zhang Yunling suddenly remembered something. His smiling face stiffened. That's right, he still needed a Xuanlong Ginseng to completely fuse the two pills into a perfect Foundation Establishment Pill!
He had only heard Granny Wang talk about and teach him about the Xuanlong Ginseng, but he had never seen it with his own eyes and didn't know where to look for it. What should he do?
Just then, a shrill scream came from afar. Zhang Yunling took a few steps forward and saw a male cultivator in white robes chasing a female cultivator. The scream for help had come from the female cultivator.
Zhang Yunling frowned, not wanting to pay any attention. He was about to turn around, put away the furnace, and leave when the female cultivator saw him. As if grasping at a lifeline, she ran straight towards him!
"Help! Please! Please save me!"
Faced with this shrill scream, Zhang Yunling sighed helplessly. This femme fatale was really irritating him. If he ignored it, the woman was about to rush towards him. But if he intervened, he would be entangled in a karmic relationship with her, and who knew what might happen in the future? This was a very troublesome situation for Zhang Yunling, who was eager for revenge.