Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit - Chapter 355.2

Chapter 355.2 – Gains (2)

Lu looked at the golden sword that quivered happily when he touched it with his divine revelation.

“Spirit emerging flying sword, how marvelous.”

The Golden Scale Sword flew up from the stone table into Lu Ping’s hands as an abundance of true energy immediately surged into the sword, leaving a branding in it. A second later, the Golden Scale Sword disappeared.

At this stage, the previous Golden Scale Sword that only had three Mystical Inscriptions was gradually falling behind, so he had already planned to upgrade it. However, Chen Lian wasn’t good enough to complete the job, so he had to wait for Chen Lian’s teacher to be free.

The result of his patience was a refined Golden Scale Sword that now had four Mystical Inscriptions.

Hu Lili was surprised to see Lu Ping refine the Golden Scale Sword so quickly, “Chen Lian specially requested his teacher, Enlightened Master Xuan-Huo, to help you upgrade the Golden Scale Sword to a spirit emerging mystic treasure. How come you can refine a spirit emerging mystic treasure so quickly?”

Lu Ping smiled, “The Golden Scale Sword has been with me for years, the newborn sword spirit is likely able to vaguely recognize me. Besides that, the great sword divine ability might be a factor as well.”

Hu Lili rolled her eyes, and teased, “Braggart!”

Her charming smile attracted Lu Ping’s intense gaze, making her blush cutely, and in turn, leaving Lu Ping in a daze.

Seeing that Hu Lili was about to explode with shyness, Lu Ping quickly cleared his throat, and asked, “What about your nascent weapon?”

Hu Lili recollected her composure, and frowned, “I’ve already thought it through. In my teacher’s cultivation lineage, we usually have a formation chassis as our nascent weapon. I like the idea, and it fits me well too. But, I’m not sure which nascent formation I should choose, and I also don’t have enough materials for the chassis yet.”

Lu Ping smiled at her, “Did you forget about me already?”

Hu Lili blushed again after hearing the question that could be understood in two ways. Before she could say anything, Lu Ping had already taken out a charred wood branch and two other normal-looking wood branches from his interspatial ring.

“They are both mutated spirit woods, see if anything fits your needs, or you can just take both.”

Hu Lili looked at the tiny lightning arcs sparking across the surface of the charred wood branch, and asked with surprise, “A Thousand-Wood Lightning Struck Peach Tree Branch? Since when did you get something like that? This will make a good material for my nascent chassis; I know just the perfect nascent formation to use in the chassis.”

Hu Lili didn’t regard herself as an outsider and picked up the charred wood branch to keep inside her interspatial bracelet. Then, she took out a jade bottle, and said, “One for one. You aren’t the only one who’s acquired things over the years. This is a peculiar water known as the Spirit Clarity Stone Water. It’s perfect for the [Tri-Pristine True Vision]. From the Enigmatic Purified Water you’ve given to me, I know that you must have already successfully cultivated the [Tri-Pristine true Vision] into a mini divine ability. But if you continue to enhance it, it can still improve.”

Lu Ping was overjoyed, “It’s a precious treasure. The [Tri-Pristine True Vision] is a crucial component of my overall strength.This peculiar water will come in handy; you’re such a great help.”

Hu Lili suddenly lowered her voice, “You’re the one that’s helping me all the time… The Heart Condensation Pellet, Seven Step Striped Pellet, Reverie Pellet, and Enigmatic Purified Water, it’s all thanks to them that I got to breakthrough to the Core Forging Realm so early, even teacher is surprised by my progress. And now, there’s the Thousand-Wood Lightning Struck Peach Tree Branch. Regardless of what others say, I can’t stand letting myself drag you behind and not help in the slightest.”

Lu Ping frowned deeply, “Regardless of what others say… what did they… It doesn’t matter, only wastrels will spend their time talking crap and being jealous of others’ achievements. We just have to focus on climbing higher where their voices can no longer reach our ears.”

Hu Lili nodded quietly.

As their hearts were tied together, Lu Ping and Hu Lili understood each other the most. Even though Hu Lili always looked calm and gentle, she was in fact also full of pride, so she naturally affected after hearing such slander.

Lu Ping quickly changed the topic, “Now that you’re in the Core Forging Realm, you’re also required to set up a cave-dwelling on Tian Ling Mountain. Have you found a nice location yet? We will need to have a small gathering at your place when it’s done.”

Hu Lili smiled, “Not yet. Time flies so fast, it’s been three years since all our friends last met. In the past three years, everyone has progressed well, we’re now more capable and are given important assignments by the sect. It will only get more difficult to find opportunities to meet up in the future; this is definitely a good time to have another gathering.”

After some time, Hu Lili left the cave-dwelling and Lu Ping returned to his cultivation room. He sat down quietly for a moment, before a vortex of spiritual energy started to form, with him in the center.

Suddenly, Lu Ping jolted for a split second. Twelve spirit pearls, shining with five colors and brimming with spiritual energy, appeared in the room and started orbiting around him.

Looking closely, the spiritual energy in the spirit pearls was actually made up of three waves of spiritual energies. These waves of spiritual energies were formless, but they generally maintained the shape of a peculiar-looking Jiao.

The Jiaos had the body of snakes, the claws of crocodiles, and the whiskers of golden carps. They were just like the shape of Lu Ping’s divine revelation in his Golden Core!

In the past three years, Lu Ping had successfully upgraded the Nascent Primordial Stars into a set of mystic treasures with three Mystical Inscriptions!

While the spirit pearls orbited slowly around him, Lu Ping’s body jolted again for a split second.

This time, a jade-white lotus appeared above his head. The lotus flower had nine-layers of petals, with each layer having nine petals. The lotus rotated slowly above his head, while the Nascent Primordial Stars started to glow like stars.

The Ninth Rank White Lotus glowed in resonance with the Nascent Primordial Stars. Every time the lotus glowed, the complicated patterns would light up the petals. Each petal had different patterns, and the patterns linked with each other, as if they belonged to one single pattern.

At the corner of one of the petals, there was a small blank space which hadn’t been filled with any patterns. This was the final portion of the pattern that had yet to be completed.

However, whenever the white lotus glowed, the patterns on the petal would extend slightly further, gradually filling up the blank space.

It turned out that Lu Ping was using his divine revelation to connect with the Nascent Primordial Stars so that he could use them to connect with the Ninth Rank White Lotus and complete the final pattern.

Given that the rest of the lotus had already been completed with patterns, a great deal of time and effort must have been expended to reach this stage. For a long time, Lu Ping sat in the same spot, doing nothing besides trying to complete the final piece of the puzzle.

After losing track of time, the spirit pearls orbiting Lu Ping suddenly disappeared from the room, followed by the lotus above him.

Lu Ping shook his head with fatigue and thought, The Nascent Primordial Star Array Formation is so difficult and tedious to engrave. It tests the limits of divine revelation every time I engrave the formation on the lotus. At least it also trains my divine revelation in the process. Finally, I’m only left with the last bit to complete.

Lu Ping suddenly smiled bitterly when he thought about the strenuous expenditure of true energy needed to cast the Primordial Stars. If the Primordial Stars were already this draining, how tiring would it be to cast the Nascent Primordial Star Array Formation?

One must know, the Primordial Stars had always been just an incomplete version of his nascent weapon. The full form of the nascent weapon was actually the Nascent Primordial Star Array Formation, which required twelve nodes and one core.

In his case, the Primordial Stars were the nodes, and the Ninth Rank White Lotus was going to be the core. With the nascent formation now completed with a core, its power would definitely rise sharply, and so would the consumption of his true energy.

Lu Ping sighed and then took out Landslide.

Landslide only had one Mystical Inscription, but its performance was amongst the top out of all the mystic treasures he has used. However, the one issue with Landslide was its future potential since it was difficult to find suitable Mystical Inscriptions for it.

Lu Ping kept Landslide away and walked out of his cave-dwelling.

Three years ago, he had performed a meritorious deed during the monster invasion. He hadn’t gone to claim his rewards yet because he had immediately entered closed-door cultivation to recover and cultivate upon his return. Now was the time to ask for his rewards.

In the previous monster invasion that ignited the ongoing human-monster war, the Zhen Ling Sect had suffered the least damage. Hence, when the monster race took advantage of Great Ancestor Liu Tian-Ling’s Avatar Forum to launch a monster invasion and a secret infiltration on Zhen Ling Sect, the general reaction of the other human sects was to sit back and watch Zhen Ling Sect’s awkward situation.

However, the monster invasion and siege on Xuan Qi Island was single-handedly stopped by Lu Ping after he killed one Early Core Forging Realm monster and another Fifth Layer Core Forging Realm monster, while sending two other monster Enlightened Masters into retreat.

On top of that, the second generation of Zhen Ling Sect disciples also shocked the North Ocean with their prowess. Among the Seven Sages, besides the one member who hadn’t appeared for a long time, and the other two that had advanced to the Avatar Realm, two of them were in the Peak Core Forging Realm, and the other two were also in the Ninth Layer Core Forging Realm.

In front of these four Sages, the monster infiltrators and invasion failed terribly. A total of 13 monster Enlightened Masters died in their hands with a few others being severely injured, while Zhen Ling Sect itself suffered no casualties at all.

Since the war had started, this was the cleanest and greatest victory for the human race. Naturally, Zhen Ling Sect’s reputation and morale was greatly boosted.

Although Lu Ping killed two monster Enlightened Masters and plundered their wealth, he didn’t actually reap a great harvest.

For starters, the monster Enlightened Masters’ Golden Cores, which were the most precious things, exploded into spiritual energy. Their nascent weapons, which were the most valuable belongings, were also destroyed in the battle by his great sword divine ability.

Most of the things left to plunder were just spirit herbs, spirit materials, and spirit stones. Since the monster race lorded over the vast and resourceful ocean, they were generally far wealthier than humans.

The two monster Enlightened Masters’ wealth sustained Lu Ping’s expenditures for the past three years. Most notably, there was a peculiar water which he had fused with to enhance his [Heavenly Curtain Aegis], taking it to the stage of being almost like a defensive mystic treasure with three Mystical Inscriptions.This was why Lu Qin wasn’t able to break his aegis energy.

Chong Hua Palace was still in the same place. Great Ancestor Liu Tian-Ling didn’t move her cave-dwelling to the mountaintop where the spiritual energy was at its highest concentration, despite her advancement.

Lu Ping walked to the lakeshore, while the Dao soldiers in the lake quickly surfaced, forming a bridge with their bodies to allow him to walk across the lake to the palace. This made Lu Ping laugh speechlessly because he hadn’t asked them to do so. It seemed that ever since the snake trio had trained them for the Avatar Realm Forum, they were even more disciplined and understanding.

When Lu Ping crossed the door and entered the hall, he felt a split second of dizziness, before finding himself surrounded by a high concentration of spiritual energy equivalent to that of a large spirit vein.

Lu Ping was surprised, before he quickly understood something.

A distinct trait of the Avatar Realm was a mastery over space. His teacher must have shifted the real Chong Hua Palace to the mountaintop whilst leaving a spatial doorway at the old site.

As Lu Ping entered the hall, he saw Little Junior Martial Sister Jiang Xuan-Xuan sitting down. Her hands propped her chin up as she daydreamed.

When she saw Lu Ping, her eyes lit up brightly and she quickly hopped over to him. Reaching out with her hands out, she said happily, “Ninth Senior Brother, where are my Perfumy Pellets and Amethyst Pellets? And the playmate you promised you’d find to play with me?”

Lu Ping helplessly passed her a jade bottle, and asked, “The Perfumy Pellets are just trivial amusements, why do you like them so much? You are a noble Core Forging Realm Enlightened Master!”

Jiang Xuan-Xuan opened the cork and immediately, a familiar fragrance found its way into her nose causing her to nod in satisfaction.

After keeping the jade bottle away, she put her hands on her hips, and said, “And?”

Lu Ping handed her another three jade bottles. This time, he cautioned her, “I’ve added Amethyst Bee Honey to them. But they’re still cultivation pellets, so you mustn’t eat them like sweets!”

Jiang Xuan-Xuan made a face at him, and said mischievously, “Yeah, yeah, Ninth Senior Brother, you nag like an old man.”

Jiang Xuan-Xuan looked around, and after noticing that no one was with Lu Ping, she frowned and said unhappily, “Where’s my friend that you promised to bring?”

Lu Ping smiled. A young girl around the age of thirteen miraculously appeared behind him.

The young girl moved half her body behind Lu Ping and made a face at Jiang Xuan-Xuan. Clearly, this was also another naughty little girl.