As I wonder towards my destination, I come across all sorts of fellow cultivators despotic actions. In the end I began to appreciate those who overestimate themselves and attack directly, thus saving me time from dealing with such nonsense. The only reason to follow some trash was to check out what treasures they have in their homes. In the end, these treasure runs sure help break up the monopoly of endless trees and mountains.
In the end my stockpile of looted void containers number so far three hundred and forty two. I am far too lazy to search though them other than send in my divine sense to check for anything I would consider a treasure. So far nothing really worth my effort, but I just won't let others loot these bodies. It's not in my nature to leave loose change lying around, besides having extra disposable void containers come in handy.
The next interesting event was discovering a particular enclosed mountain valley that was protected by a decaying camoflage restriction. I entered to check it out and found an unclaimed medical garden. In each raise plot of medicinal earth grows a single surviving spiritual plant. I harvest the usable parts from each plant and tossed the rich medicinal earth into my dantian's inner world. I watch the barren lands show a trace of vitality as grass and simple plants give my innerworld a touch of green.
Most cultivators can only just cultivate as they struggle towards the peak of stage eight. But with master's inner world techniques, I can enhance my inner world directly. The inner world directly relates to how much potential you gain each small and large advances for a stage nine expert. So the better inner world I can create before I advance to stage nine would simply be a huge bonus in the long run. I'll be able stand proud when I greet my master!
Enough reminescing, I feel a pulse of energy nearby, that fades in and out of my divine sense. Most likely a concealment formation is running out of energy or is damaged in some way. I cut my divine sense on my right side off leaving only my left side still watching for trouble, and notice the faint pulse is missing. Good, let do that again and put up my right flank back up and and again no faint energy pulse. Then let cut it down some more as I let my divine slowly intrude into the search area until half is remaining. So it's in that area and I look to my two o'clock and begin moving that way.
It did not take long to find a vent on the side of a mountain imitting the faint energy pulse. So it's somewhere deep inside this mountain as I let my divine sense enter the vent and begin probing it's depths. It didn't take long for my divine sense to bump into a barrier. The formation that is concealing the barrier is fading ever so slowly. The energy pulse is from that tier nine barrier exceeding the concealment formation's abilty to hide it's energy emissions in some kind of cyclic rotation.
I immediately place a new concealment formation over the entire mountain. Then create a false copy of the energy pulse and threw it over the next mountain range where suddenly gave off powerful surge of tier eight weapon qi energy that disappears in an instant. Any cultivator who's divine sense can pick up this surge of weapon qi would instantly lock on to the false mountain range.
With a thought I make my divine sense enlarge the path to the barrier and dove right into the underground maze and reaching the barrier in a few minutes. I put a new concealment formation behind me and with with a quick wave of my hand cause the malfunctioning concealment formation to vanish and then stare intently into the array barrier. A stage nine expert created this barrier, but he was no expert in arrays. My knowledge in arrays also basic because I use a branch that specialize in artificing arrays. Even so, I can tell the barrier isn't anything special, just a lot of power was imbued in it.
I set up my master breaching array quickly and power it up and see how it works. It latches on to barrier and begins adapting to the barrier's energy signiture. As it slowly infiltrates the barrier, it begins to emulate the barrier itself. Eventually an hour passes before it takes over enough of the barrier to opens a doorway for me to pass though. I order the door to close, no sense letting some one else in for free. I watch the formation still slowing eating away at the protective barrier expanding its area of control.
I am on the edge of the space under the branches of a Tivari Nettoflower tree who branches are long enough to reach out thirty meters creating a cealing under the tree about thirty meters high. At the base of the tree is a pair of peak tier seven beastfolk with wolfish faces with attitude as they growl at me to leave.
I look at the Tivari Nettoflower as scintillating energies slowly rise up from the ground though the invisible tree. But the rising energy causes that part of the tree to appear. On a low branch near the trunk is a beautiful night flower with shades of purples and orange veins and outlines. That pulse goes directly to the single fruit the flower is bearing . I see all remaining branches except this one holding the fruit have all died off. All the lifeforce this giant tree once had has been sacrificed to bear this one nearly ripe fruit.
The flower itself is also valuable. Having survived on the excess energies the tree was providing to rear this one fruit, a single pedal can be use to boost the effectiveness of tier seven nirvana breakthough pills. I look up to see the outer branches have been sucked dry by the fruit, and the wind is slow erroding the branches away into fine dust.
Then I glance at the growling wolf folk and with a thought draw my sword and charge forward. They go full beast on me right away, no playing around with the spiritual fruit about to be born. As we dance under the pulsating dying tree, I quickly realise just how slow they are ay end of the our first exchange. I see the two are unable to react to my last attack as they are still recovering from their last parries.
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So I put my sword away then step into Whitelocks personal space grabbing his right hand with my right hand so the the sword's guard is against my thumb and fore finger. Then I use my might to squeeze his hand as hard I can to to force his hand to slip towards the pummel.
While I spin counter clockwise he can't keep up and is forced to be dragged trying to hold on to his sword as I use it to parry the other opponent's sword and push it up high causing the sword's owner to finally let go. I continue to spin until I see the back of the his neck and behead him. Then I simply attack other until he can't block no more I land in my free hit. This time I push his sword from the left to right and stepped into is personal space and drove the dagger in my left hand into is right eye to finish the battle.
I look at the Tivari Nettoflower as scintillating energies slowly rise up from the ground though the invisible tree. That pulse goes directly to the single fruit it's bearing . I see all remaining branches except this one holding the fruit have finally erroded away. All the lifeforce this giant tree once had was finally sacrificed to bear this one offspring and the flower that bore it.
This fruit is the key ingrediant for tier eight nirvana breakthough pills. While each pedal of the flower can boost the effectiveness of tier seven nirvana breakthough pills by as much twenty percent. In my master's memories it is common to see fellow cultivators bring in the fruit at auction houses, and when ask about the flower they would often state they didn't know it was valuable too. I stare at the flower full of vibrancy and energy, how could they think the flower wasn't valuable?
I pull out a large jade case and check the formations within to see that they are all working fine. I gingerly take hold of the two inches of branch at the base of the flower with my right hand and with a thought and cut it with a wisp of qi empowered divine sense. Then I slowly place the fruit and flower intact into the case and watch the formation hold it place away from the sides and place it in time suspension when I sealed the lid on.
Then I place it in master's ring before looking though the wolf folk void containers. I put the tradeable assets into master's ring and toss the two void containers into the junk pouch. When I arrive at the now deceased barrier my divine sense tell me no one has been here. A quick peek with my divine sense tells me no cultivators are nearby and I fly low as I head away from the searching cultivators in the nearby mountain range.
A few days later I ask the fellow cultivators I pass by for the direction of the nearest auction house. It still takes a few days on my flying sword to get there. Like the first city I called home, this place is fortified by only two walls and probably only eighty percent of the population of my city. Seeing there is no flying restrictions as I watch fellow cultivators fly right in with out worry.
Sending in my divine sense I quickly locate the action house and fly in for a landing on it's barrier protection surface. Above the ground entrance is a giant balcony where cultivators can land and enter though a more elegant entrance with beautiful tier five hostesses to greet you. I pick out a free one and use a movement skill to move towards her. She notice me and smile and gives a formal bow as I stop before her.
"Greeting young master, how can this auction house serve you?" asks the blond hostess.
I smile her a greeting and reply "a workshop please, perhaps for two tendays."
She gives me a even more lovely smile before attending me "this way young master! I have never seen a crafter so young before. You must have some serious background young master!"
I let her prattle with her girlish ways while giving the occasional encouragement to prove I was listening to her." She gives me a smile in gratitude and continue her hostessing in a more relaxed manner. We humor each other as we fly though the central open shaft in the middle of the building to reach the top floor.
Our word play eventually evolves to her asking me "do you like to see the sun rise or the sunset? Or do you like both?"
Understanding her meaning I settle for "both, north if you have it" in after thought.
She sends her thought elsewhere for a bit before announcing "your in luck, the north workshop is now yours. Is there anything our auction house can provide you?"
Her polite prying I decide to answer with "tier seven artificing materials will be appreciated" then I hand her my premade void pouch with three tier seven spears and a list of materials I wanted to work with. Then to answer her growing question "please sell these spears to fund the materials I requested. As a friendly reminder I state "the second half of the list is for when I leave and to give your people time to collect some of those items."
She gives another dazzling smile as she hands me the control jade key and bows as I activate the key and enter a workshop I am used to seeing. So it's a common design in this world, most likely designed by a crafter since it is appealing to work in. This soft white space with minimal distractions is a perfect place for crafting with no shadows to hide any details.
I settle in to wait for the materials with a random jug of cultivation wine from my loot as I view this new city. Only two palaces in the inner wall seems intimadating enough to take notice of them. Which promptly asked when the hostess returns with the materials I requested. She tells me "the central palace is owned by the city lord's family and the other is the owner of this auction house. We are a branch family, the main branch lives in our capital."
"How far is the capital" I asked.
"Our merchant ships usually take four to five tendays to fly a round trip" she supplies.
"Thank you for your assistance" as I show her out of the workshop. Closed the door and turn the outside view into that fuzzy white I like to work in. After so many days traveling, the itch to work was quite fierce. I spend the days in blessed emptiness as I let my knowledge work it's wonders. While traveling I finally figured out the A Slice of Primal Fire technique.
Basically I time freeze some Primal Fire then shape it using my spiritual force into the shape of the sword that I have in mind. Using a formation I take a slice of the Primal Fire and solified it into a sword though the use of many formations. Then feed it eighty seven fire attributed tier seven materials to strengthen it's material form, then finally use that tier eight Firecrazed Raptor core to serve as a spirit host. Tie in a few maintence formations and I got myself a slice of pure destruction.
My ancestor was damn cool to create this technique as I watch this slice the living Primal Fire exude an aura of divine class spiritual fire. It's flame like aura greedily attacking the surrounding air as it sucks in latent energies. I swing the weapon experimentally and watch the perfectly merged Primal Fire Qi and sword qi leave after affects as it passes though space.