bookbashuk Chapter 57 Cultivation Technique Selection
Chapter 57 Cultivation Technique Selection
"Junior Sister Guan, please show mercy! I, Zhu, concede defeat!" Zhu Qingyuan had already suffered a significant loss of magical power in the previous attack and had also suffered a considerable backlash. If it weren't for his abundant magical power, his level one fire shield would have collapsed under the attack of the opponent's small sword. The fact that he was able to withstand a whole round of attacks from Guan Jing was quite surprising to her.
His face was pale at this moment, and he spoke loudly without hesitation.
The woman remained expressionless upon seeing this. She withdrew her hand seals, and the sword and four blades in the air dissipated into specks of spiritual light.
"I didn't expect Junior Sister Guan to have advanced to the fourth level of Qi Refining and cultivated the Mother-Child Sword Technique to the second level. I admire you!" Zhu Qingyuan smiled bitterly, his expression somber.
"Senior Brother Zhu, you flatter me." The woman bowed slightly, her expression calm, without offering much further comment.
"Guan Jingsheng, both of you, exit!"
The audience erupted in uproar.
The Foundation Establishment Deacon who was presiding over the competition glanced at Guan Jing, a strange light flashing in his eyes, but he quickly regained his composure. With a flick of his token, the barrier light screen opened up again, and the two people on the stage stepped out.
"A disciple with such talent and cultivation would have been classified as an inner disciple and given special attention in my Zishan Sect long ago, but in your Kongsang Sect, he is only an outer disciple."
"The millennia-old heritage of the Kongsang Sect is truly incomparable to that of a small sect like my Zishan Sect." The Purple Flame Venerable on the platform spoke with a complex expression, his voice filled with emotion.
"Brother Ziyan, there's no need for that. The profound foundation of a sect cannot be controlled by one person or one generation; it takes thousands of years of accumulation to make any difference."
Moreover, your young friend Wu Hao is quite talented, already on par with our inner disciples. He's probably a core disciple in the Purple Mountain Sect by now." Upon hearing this, Xu Muchun was naturally very pleased, but he still managed to smooth things over with a few polite words.
Upon hearing this, Wu Hao's face lit up with joy, and a smug look appeared on his face.
"Brother Xu is joking. How could a small sect like ours dare to designate a core disciple? He's just a slightly special inner disciple."
Disciples with Hao'er's talent are few and far between in my Zishan Sect, numbering only a dozen or so. Compared to Kongsang Sect, they are not worth mentioning. Master Ziyan understood the other party's polite tone, and felt even more bitter inside. He could only offer a few perfunctory words with a smile.
Xu Muchun smiled slightly and then remained silent.
"Lu Mu, Sun Luobin, enter!"
As the Foundation Establishment Steward spoke in a loud voice, two more outer disciples stepped onto the stage, and soon after, a series of booming sounds were heard.
This was the first time Du Fan had ever witnessed such a large-scale battle, and it was naturally an eye-opener. The colorful glow of the surrounding clouds dazzled him, and the earth-shattering roar of the colliding spells shook him to his core. After the intense shock, he gained a deeper understanding of the power of cultivators.
And so, as dusk approached, the top five outer disciples were determined, consisting of three men and two women.
One of the women was Guan Jing, who had a delicate and pretty face; the other was a cold and aloof woman named Kong Qing.
Du Fan had never seen the aloof and beautiful woman named Kong Qing before; she must have been an outer disciple who had already completed her duel before he arrived.
Among the other three male disciples, one was the tall Yang Lin, another was the somewhat frail-looking Sun Luobin, and the last one surprised Du Fan upon seeing him.
This man was someone he knew well. He was incredibly obese, and his small eyes were almost squeezing open by the lumps of fat on his face. This man was none other than Wan Baoshan, the senior disciple of the outer sect and the person in charge of logistics for the Kongsang Sect!
"It is getting late today, so the outer sect competition is over. Tomorrow at Chenshi (7-9 AM), the top five will be determined, and the sect rewards will be distributed to the outer sect disciples ranked in the top one thousand according to the competition results."
The speaker was the bald elder on the platform. His voice was loud and clear, echoing throughout the entire outer gate square. After he finished speaking, the three Golden Core experts on the platform took the lead and walked out of the square, followed closely by the others.
Before leaving, Wu Hao glanced at the crowd in the square with a flickering look in his eyes, and finally left with some doubt.
Du Fan's face darkened as he watched Wu Hao's departing figure.
Congratulations, Senior Brother Wan!
Congratulations, Senior Sister Kong!
"Congratulations……"
After the Foundation Establishment deacon who presided over the competition also left the square, the entire square seemed to boil over, with congratulations rising and falling. But how many of them were sincere, only heaven knows.
"Sigh, how boring!" Ye Feng sighed, looking utterly disheartened.
"Brother Du, let's go. Didn't you say that many young and beautiful female disciples have recently joined the outer sect? But they're all just ordinary beauties. Not one of them can compare to Chu Qian. It's really disappointing!" Ye Feng sighed and pulled Du Fan out of the outer sect square.
Du Fan was speechless. He didn't know if Ye Feng had high standards or was simply tired of beautiful women. In his eyes, everyone, whether it was the female cultivators below the stage or Guan Jing and Kong Qing, who were ranked in the top five, was a rare beauty.
He even secretly compared it to Earth. This world could be described as having a multitude of beautiful women, all of whom were naturally beautiful without makeup. He suspected that this situation might be related to the so-called spiritual energy of the weather. Could it be that the spiritual energy of heaven and earth could also have the effect of beautifying and nourishing the skin?
He plans to take some time to research this...
However, in Ye Feng's eyes, these beautiful women were like ugly gourds and cracked dates. If it were just them, it would be fine, but he couldn't even be bothered to glance at beauties like Qin Xiaoran, which puzzled him.
Du Fan was not a busybody, so he naturally wouldn't waste his breath on such a matter, especially since the thought of Wu Hao ignited a fire within him.
……
At this moment, Du Fan and Ye Feng were on the bluestone ground at the foot of a mountain, walking towards the inner gate.
"Brother Ye, I heard that the inner sect is also holding a grand competition. Don't you need to make any preparations?" Du Fan asked, recalling what Wan Baoshan had mentioned about it the other day.
"This competition is special. Core disciples don't need to participate. It only involves the inner disciples of Emerald Bamboo Garden and Green Pine Garden. Among the many female disciples of Emerald Bamboo Garden, only that Xia Rui sister can make my heart flutter. The others are not very attractive."
After walking out of the outer square, Ye Feng looked extremely disappointed and somewhat dejected. Upon hearing this, he replied casually.
"Ahem..." Du Fan coughed lightly and stopped talking.
……
Back in the spirit garden, Du Fan saw a figure standing there. Upon closer inspection, he realized it was Wang San, the warehouse handyman.
"Brother Du, you're finally back. If it had been any later, I probably would have had to leave." Wang San greeted Du Fan with a smile as soon as he saw him return.
"The outer sect is holding a grand competition. I had nothing to do, so I went over to watch the excitement. I'm sorry to have kept you waiting, Brother Wang. I wonder if you have something important to discuss with me?"
This was the first time he had seen Wang San since their trip to the Land of the Dispersed. After all, the two had fought side by side in the Land of the Dispersed and gone through life and death, which had made their relationship closer. Du Fan smiled as well.
"Brother Du, you're really living a leisurely life. I'm afraid you've mostly forgotten about that matter. If I had known that, I wouldn't have come." Upon hearing Du Fan's words, Wang San suddenly revealed a strange smile.
"Oh? Now that you mention it, Brother Wang, I'm quite curious. Please enlighten me!" Du Fan's eyes flashed, but he really couldn't recall anything special.
"Haha... If it were anyone else, I would find an excuse to leave without hesitation, but I really can't do that to Brother Du. Here, take these."
Wang San suddenly burst into laughter, and at the same time, he slapped his palm on the storage bag at his waist. A gray shadow flashed out from it, which he quickly grabbed. It turned out to be a gray cloth bag. Then, with a flick of his wrist, he threw it to Du Fan.
"This is..." Du Fan subconsciously caught the gray cloth bag, and with a sweep of his divine sense, he discovered that it contained a hundred low-grade spirit stones.
"Brother Du, do you still remember the level one demonic wolf that the three of us, Zhang Dashan and I, killed together? When we took out the demonic core, we agreed that we would sell the demonic core and split the spirit stones we got.
This morning, by sheer chance, I learned that a Foundation Establishment deacon needed the magic core of a level one magical beast for refining a weapon. So I went to give it a try. Unexpectedly, the deacon was exceptionally kind and exchanged the magic core for two hundred spirit stones.
Now that Brother Zhang is no longer here, it is only natural that the two of us should divide these spirit stones equally. Seeing that Du Fan had truly forgotten, Wang San stopped being mysterious and told him the truth.
"So that's what it was. I've been so busy lately that I forgot. Thank you, Brother Wang!" Du Fan suddenly realized and unceremoniously put away the bag of spirit stones.
The two then chatted casually for a while, naturally mentioning their experiences in the Land of the Departed, as well as Zhang Dashan's death. Both of them seemed somewhat sentimental at the end, and it was very late when Wang San took his leave.
Back in the hut, Du Fan swallowed a drop of calming essential oil and immediately felt refreshed and full of energy.
Du Fan discovered this the day before; the Concentration Oil not only helps with concentration and aids in cultivation, but it also counteracts sleepiness.
In other words, after taking one drop of calming essential oil, even if you don't sleep all night, you will still feel energetic and refreshed the next day. I just don't know if doing this will leave any aftereffects.
However, Du Fan couldn't care less about that now. Since Wu Hao was in the Kongsang Sect, his mind became more active, and a murderous intent surfaced deep within his heart.
After sitting cross-legged, he took out all the ghost cultivation techniques he had obtained from Gui Yuan and looked at them one by one.
An hour later, Du Fan slowly opened his eyes, his face looking rather pale.
"I didn't expect that a small portion of the techniques required special conditions to cultivate, and these conditions were simply impossible for me to meet."
Most of the remaining cultivation techniques require reaching the first level of the Qi Refining stage and possessing magical power before they can be practiced.
Thinking of this, Du Fan couldn't help but feel a little discouraged. Obviously, those were not techniques he could cultivate immediately. In the end, he turned his attention to the last two techniques, namely the "Spirit Devouring Technique" and the "Ghost Curse Technique" that he had been most interested in before.