Chapter 11: Officially Stepping onto the Path of Immortality—The Spirit Refinement Realm!

Everything proceeded in an orderly fashion, save for the final step of condensing the pills; the fire was too fierce, and in an instant, five of the twelve batches of medicinal liquid were lost, much to his distress. Although his pill-refining technique had been perfected by the system, he had never actually practiced it himself, so mistakes were only natural. With a few more tries, he would surely attain true perfection.

With the aid of the magical pill furnace, he did not need to bear the burden of channeling the earth-fire himself. All that was required was to continually infuse his spiritual intent, using his primordial energy as a guide to refine at a steady pace. Coupled with his superior pill-refining skills, the process proved less taxing than expected; a furnace of pills could be refined in half a day, left to settle for another half, and after a night’s rest, he could begin anew the next day.

Thus, after five days, his final batch yielded twelve pills, and his foundational pill-refining skill had reached consummate mastery. In all, using five sets of ingredients, he produced forty-six Nourishing Qi Pills—a bountiful harvest.

These would be sufficient to carry him from the seventh level of Nourishing Qi all the way to the peak of the ninth. Without delay, he swallowed one; as soon as it touched his tongue, it transformed into a current of energy rushing straight to his dantian. Wherever it passed, his blood surged with vitality, his meridians expanded slightly, and the medicinal power finally settled within his core.

Activating the Song of the Yellow Court, the strand of primordial energy within him stirred, dashing through his body, leaping from place to place. Each time it circulated through his dantian, it swept away a substantial portion of the pill’s power. After three complete cycles, the medicinal essence was fully absorbed.

His cultivation advanced by a significant margin, just shy of breaking through to the eighth level of Nourishing Qi. These pills should not be taken too quickly, so Cao Chengyu consumed one every other day, using the intervening days to solidify his foundation with the Song of the Yellow Court.

As his cultivation increased, his aptitude and comprehension were further refined by the Dao Song. After a month, he reached the peak of the ninth level of Nourishing Qi. To his surprise, only sixteen pills had been consumed, leaving thirty in surplus. These could surely be exchanged with others for resources, so he kept them safely at hand.

The next and most crucial step awaited: swallowing the Meridian-Opening Pill to break through in one stroke to the Spirit-Refining Realm. Then, Cao Chengyu could finally refine spiritual energy, merging it with his own primordial essence and transforming it into mana. The Brightflame Pill Furnace—this mid-tier first-grade magical furnace—could also be refined and stored within his dantian.

Calm and composed, Cao Chengyu prepared himself, took out a Meridian-Opening Pill, and swallowed it in a single gulp. Instantly, the spiritual energy within the entire volcanic cave surged violently, rushing into his body; wherever it passed, his meridians were cleared without exception. Even if impurities remained, the transformation wrought during the Nourishing Qi stage had left them fragile. The pill’s power was fierce, and in a short time, almost all of Cao Chengyu’s major meridians were unblocked.

Only the finer channels required his utmost concentration to regulate the force of the spiritual energy. Otherwise, at best, the meridians would be damaged; at worst, they would be severed entirely, ending his path to immortality.

Breaking through took far longer than Cao Chengyu had anticipated; even with the help of the Meridian-Opening Pill, it took over three days. Yet the result was a favorable one. In two and a half months of cultivation, he had successfully entered the first stage of Spirit-Refining—the Meridian-Opening Realm.

In this realm, the first step was to clear all the meridians of the body, achieving a flawless Dao body. The second was to absorb spiritual energy and convert it into mana, continually nourishing the meridians until they could bear the spinning of magical force—at which point one would reach the second stage, Qi-Absorption.

The process could be accelerated by special cultivation methods, but the Song of the Yellow Court in Cao Chengyu’s hands only covered the Nourishing Qi portion. The later stages offered no benefit. Nonetheless, the Song, requiring no conscious control, operated ceaselessly, absorbing external spiritual energy and losing little to other spirit-refining techniques.

As he needed to make haste to the capital, there was no time to practice new methods; using the Song of the Yellow Court for the Nourishing Qi layer would suffice for now. He could treat the journey as a leisurely tour.

Having already been delayed by a month and a half, he resolved to quicken his pace. Now that he had broken through to the Spirit-Refining Realm, a dense fog of mana had formed within him; he could wield Windstride and Object Manipulation with ease, and could even begin practicing the Fivefold Fire Technique.

The Brightflame Pill Furnace was stored in his dantian, ready for future use. Lacking a suitable vessel for the Nourishing Qi Pills, he protected them with his own mana.

Leaving the hot spring, he found Little Wind, his horse, who had grown thin in his absence, clearly having fared poorly in the mountains. Stroking the animal’s head, he mounted and prepared to depart.

At that moment, he saw a little girl skipping toward the spring. Having gone some distance from the hot spring to find Little Wind, he had not been noticed. As she ran, she muttered to herself,

“My brother gained his immortal physique because of this very hot spring. Father says I only need to bathe once a month, but I refuse. I insist on coming every half month—surely my talent will surpass my brother’s! Hehe.”

It was the same little girl from a month and a half ago. Cao Chengyu must not have noticed her before, absorbed as he was in cultivation within the volcanic cave.

Indeed, this hot spring, saturated with fire energy, had a purifying effect on the body; regular bathing there could expel impurities from the flesh of ordinary people. Still, at best it laid a solid foundation, but could not alter one’s innate aptitude. One either possessed the talent for cultivation or not—a chasm wider than the gulf between mortals and immortals, set at birth.

The Song of the Yellow Court came from the system; and the system, after all, was nothing but a suite of cheats, subverting common sense as a matter of course.

Shaking his head, he left. Where before he might not have noticed, now, with mana in his body, a single glance told him the truth: the little girl possessed no destiny with the Dao.

Mounted on Little Wind, he formed a hand seal; with Windstride cast, the horse became a steed that could travel a thousand miles a day, racing northward along the official road.

Along the way, Cao Chengyu passed through several large cities, once considering staying to see if any newcomers had appeared on the Ranking Board. But on reflection, he realized that, at this critical early stage of his cultivation journey, wasting time and missing the Skymonitor Tower’s examination would be unwise. The Ranking Board system, though of great help to him, required long-term cultivation of relationships—it could not be achieved overnight. Lin Jiaoyun’s case was different; her initial affinity was already high, so little effort had been required.

It was best to head straight for the capital, the heart of the Dayue Dynasty’s cultivation world, where cultivators gathered in great numbers, offering him many more targets to choose from. The sooner he arrived, the better.

Traversing mountains and rivers, crossing countless bridges and torrents, braving wind and rain, Cao Chengyu matured greatly along the journey. His once-fair skin darkened somewhat, making him appear more worldly.

A cultivator at the Nourishing Qi stage could live to one hundred and twenty; a Spirit-Refining cultivator, about one hundred and eighty. His ability to catch up to the ordinary ranks was not only due to improved aptitude, but also to fortune. While most alchemists possessed methods to sense fire veins, it was he who happened upon them by chance—truly, his luck ran deep.

Two months later, thanks to frequent use of Windstride, Cao Chengyu reached the capital even sooner.

The capital was the heart of the Dayue Dynasty and the foremost of the four prefectures of Chizhou. It was a land of extraordinary people and abundant talent, a place where heroes gathered like fish in a river—truly countless in number. It was the cradle of cultivation prodigies.

Newly arrived, Cao Chengyu had no time to savor his progress before he was startled by the conversation of passing townsfolk.